Las Vegas guide and MSE thread 2013

secretmachines

MK55 wrote: »

Well.... I've just booked the holiday for myself & my partner for June. I have got us two weeks at Vdara for £1051 via expedia (+£72 cashback form Qudico :j:j)

We are stopping at Philadelphia, save me £500 compared to flying direct... however I am sure he will be happy with a surprise Vegas Holiday for his 30th!!

I presume that's £1k per person..?

ferf1223

StuieUK34 wrote: »

And Alamo brits is a british registered company..

I am not sure that it is.

You said that rentalcars.com/CH3000 isn't British...I think it's as British as Alamo Brits...even the alamo.co.uk website is owned by the US company.

It is probably worth people checking T&Cs to be certain that there's no excess, just in case...I honestly have no idea, but having read suggestions that people buy car hire excess insurance makes me think that not all will have no excess?

traveller

Hi, I have also read on a lot of planning sites for Orlando, that it is better to buy your car hire from a british site, as it includes all insurances-which is why ours seems so dear compared to American sites. Apparently, it's because Americans, can use their own personal car insurance for rentals whereas, we cannot. The only difference, certainly with USrentacar, is if you want the windscreen and tires thing.

ferf1223

I agree on standard insurance waivers that booking through a UK site makes sense as it will likely include all expected insurance waivers...just not sure that it's automatic that there is no excess with any UK agent is all...I honestly don't know, but I don't understand why people suggest car hire excess insurance if all UK agents sell only zero excess car hire is all.

sk00bie1

traveller wrote: »

Hi, I have also read on a lot of planning sites for Orlando, that it is better to buy your car hire from a british site, as it includes all insurances-which is why ours seems so dear compared to American sites. Apparently, it's because Americans, can use their own personal car insurance for rentals whereas, we cannot. The only difference, certainly with USrentacar, is if you want the windscreen and tires thing.

I'll probably book through a US site as well as I am covered when I use Amex to pay.

In fact I haven't found any UK site (yet!) that doesn't have it included.

Would be nice to get the voucher but no point paying twice for something!

StuieUK34

u cant buy excess insurance through a UK agent....
Usrentacar give the option to buy a kind of excess insurance, but that excess as such is to cover loss of keys, tyres and windowscreen....
As traveller says, british sites include all taxes and have Zero excess
and booking via a US site or direct over there means u could have insurance via american express, etc etc.... so they dont need what we get

nvh

ferf1223 wrote: »

I agree on standard insurance waivers that booking through a UK site makes sense as it will likely include all expected insurance waivers...just not sure that it's automatic that there is no excess with any UK agent is all...I honestly don't know, but I don't understand why people suggest car hire excess insurance if all UK agents sell only zero excess car hire is all.

you're right - if Stuie is correct, then there is no way to tell what is classed as a UK site so I think it's just best to double check all the time.

For example, http://www.holidayautos.co.uk/ charge extra to cover the Standard Excess - now it could be a con, and you'd get it anyways, but i dont think i'd want to take the risk

Is holidayautos a UK website? Who knows, but its more hassle to faff around and check, than it is to read up the rental T&C's that you're agreeing to

edit: apologies, I meant to quote your 'definition of a uk agent' text... in the world of the modern web, its difficult to figure out whats uk, as they'll have a .co.uk domain and a freephone number but could still be based in the South Pole

StuieUK34

holiday autos charge extra , or call it total damage waiver, etc, that means it covers the keys, windows and tyres.......
So same as the other UK agents, no excess as per the norm, they just give u an extra and dress up the wording..
holidayautos owned by lastmin group, and generally charge more for US hire, as there market is euro.....

on UK sites, it usually states no excess... if it doesnt, your on the wrong site!
and the likes of holiday autos probably setup a different deal compared to:
usrentacar
netflights
ch3000
alamo.co.uk
nationalcar.co.uk
hertz.co.uk
and dollar.co.uk (thrifty..)

If booking a car in the states, i highly suggest checking the above sites!

traveller

After much faffing and tooing and throwing, i've gone with Usrentacar again. For 309.00 i have an intermediate SUV with dollar cancellation.As i got 10.00 off, the canx ins is basically free. So if a better deal comes up, i can always cancel.

Does Dollar express actually work at LAS as at Sanford florida, you didn't get called forward , but i did get an upgrade (not that i realised ,lol). Thanks.

ferf1223

traveller wrote: »

Does Dollar express actually work at LAS

you get to bypass the desks upstairs and go straight down to the booth in the garage...sometimes the queues upstairs are ugly so this is already a win...though sometimes there's a much shorter queue downstairs...and occasionally there's another queue for the car-pointer-outer. But it is absolutely worth having Express membership.

You can try to get your 3rd party to associate your Express number with the rental - I've had mixed success with this...when it works, the booth will already have your contract printed out...when it doesn't, they will still print it there and you've still skipped the queue.