Car hire - Theft and Damage Excess

shakedown

Just back from a great holiday in Italy but I had the worst car hire experience ever with Avis.
As I'm part of their "Preferred" programme (!) I paid up front for the rental in February. On picking up the car at Florence airport I was told that the damage / theft excess was 2500 Euro and to reduce it to nothing would cost 331 Euro (for two weeks) . At that point what can you do but accept the ripoff ? It's a text book high pressure sales technique . I usually pay a little extra to reduce excesses on car rentals but it's usually a trivial amount and it's worth it just to avoid the nonsense of counting all the scratches on a vehicle. BTW this car was two years old and had done 35000 km ! not really what you expect from a market leader like Avis . Anyway only afterwards did I discover that there are insurers who will sell you a separate policy to cover car rental excesses. My point is that car rental companies should have to publish up front what the damage and theft excesses are and how much they charge to eliminate them. Surprised that a company like Avis has so little regard for its own customers' experience tho . The reason we use the big names is an expectation that we'll get decent service and not be actively ripped off.

zagfles

shakedown wrote: »

Just back from a great holiday in Italy but I had the worst car hire experience ever with Avis.
As I'm part of their "Preferred" programme (!) I paid up front for the rental in February. On picking up the car at Florence airport I was told that the damage / theft excess was 2500 Euro and to reduce it to nothing would cost 331 Euro (for two weeks) . At that point what can you do but accept the ripoff ? It's a text book high pressure sales technique . I usually pay a little extra to reduce excesses on car rentals but it's usually a trivial amount and it's worth it just to avoid the nonsense of counting all the scratches on a vehicle. BTW this car was two years old and had done 35000 km ! not really what you expect from a market leader like Avis . Anyway only afterwards did I discover that there are insurers who will sell you a separate policy to cover car rental excesses. My point is that car rental companies should have to publish up front what the damage and theft excesses are and how much they charge to eliminate them. Surprised that a company like Avis has so little regard for its own customers' experience tho . The reason we use the big names is an expectation that we'll get decent service and not be actively ripped off.

Hertz do as well, I think most do. They usually don't quote this charge up front or let you pay in advance, as then people would shop around.

Other companies claim there is no excess but then when you pick it up they tell you that tyres, windscreen, underside etc aren't covered but you can pay a rip-off price to get them covered.

I've used insurance4carhire - never claimed but they seem to have a good reputation.

Takecareofthepennies

I second insurance4carhire.

EUR 2.5k excess seems rather, well, excessive though.