Prepay Mastercard- Can I use it for car hire abroad?

Redrobbo_2

Because of my partners unsatisfied IVA ( it will be satisfied very soon) I don't think I can get a credit card as we have a joint mortgage and a joint loan which both predate the IVA and 2 joint current accounts. I am therefore financially associated.

We are going away on a holiday in July (my parents paid for our flights and apartment) and need to hire a car.

It would sem that car hire firms will only accept payment by Credit Card or else we would need to leave a £500 cash deposit which I don't want to do. Cash car hire firms seem to be higher rental rates too.

Would they accept a prepay Mastercard?

fiveyearplan

I think some people on here have been able to use prepay CC for car hire in Europe but why don't you phone them and see.

never-in-doubt

Redrobbo wrote: »

Because of my partners unsatisfied IVA ( it will be satisfied very soon) I don't think I can get a credit card as we have a joint mortgage and a joint loan which both predate the IVA and 2 joint current accounts. I am therefore financially associated.

We are going away on a holiday in July (my parents paid for our flights and apartment) and need to hire a car.

It would sem that car hire firms will only accept payment by Credit Card or else we would need to leave a £500 cash deposit which I don't want to do. Cash car hire firms seem to be higher rental rates too.

Would they accept a prepay Mastercard?

Some allow it others do not, in essence your pre-pay is exactly that, a pre-pay so this means that should the car hire company need to charge the account later, they may not be able to unless they do a full £500 auth on the card.

Read here: http://www.moneysupermarket.com/cards/prepaid-cards-guide1.asp

A trusted card is the Virgin one - here: http://uk.virginmoney.com/virgin/prepaid-card/

It will be in the terms of most pre-paid cards; see here for an example:

http://uk.virginmoney.com/virgin/Images/prepaid-tcs_tcm23-7152.pdf

and look at the top of page 2, term 4.5.1:

Hotels and rental cars – As Merchants may not be able to accurately
predict how much your final bill will be, they may request an
authorisation for funds greater than your Available Balance.

This pretty much means that they will ask for a larger amount than the original deposit.....