Is Monarch damage excess refund insurance worth it at £2.92 per day?

itm2

We're planning to rent a car in Faro next month via Monarch. The supplier is InterRent, who include CDW in their basic price. When I started the order however I was prompted to add Monarch's additional insurance protection for £2.92 per day (about £40 for our 14-night stay). This insurance provides Damage & theft excess refund, Tyres, windows, mirrors & wheels and Key cover & personal possessions.
Having checked the insurance4carhire site it seems that this sort of cover can be purchased from them for around £40 annually. However, since this will almost certainly be our only holiday in the next 12 months, it wouldn't appear to save us any money.
Does anyone have any views as to whether the additional Monarch insurance would be a sensible purchase?

bagand96

Having hire car excess insurance is definitely a good idea. Your hire includes insurance but it will have a large excess... and InterRent will reserve this amount on your credit card when you collect the car. Excess insurance covers you if there is an accident/damage/theft... they will refund you this deposit.

Whether Monarch's represents good value or not is up to you, but it seems expensive. For example carhireexcess.com do it for about £16 for a week. This maybe even cheaper if you go via a comparison site or use a discount code.

MoneySavingExpert's Car Hire page has a good section on this as well as some decent discount codes http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/travel/cheap-car-hire#insurancetrick

WAYT

Don't neglect to check https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/ShowTopic-g189116-i1083-k5773073-o180-Interrent_Car_Hire_Scam_Faro-Faro_Faro_District_Algarve.html

Begin from the latest post from this August .... Forewarned is forearmed.

richardw

AVOID InterRent.

Do a comparison and if the well known names are competitive go with them.

AlexMac

There are tens (no, hundreds) of thousands of stories on the web and on Tripadvisor of fraud or hassle by car hire firms in holiday destinations, who advertise low headline rates but then adopt a business model of exploiting clients with fuel scams (full-empty plus a fuelling fee), fake damage, routinely taking unexpected sums from your crdit card of hassling you into accepting added insurance (even if, like me, you have bought one-off or multi-trip excess insurance fom another provider- in your case, the agent.

This also means long arguments and queues at cheaper operators pick-up desks where low-paid staff have to play these hard-sell games or face the sack

So buyer beware

Read the excellent post by someone called ceejayblue on Tripadvisor- valid general advice even though it refers to Spain;
https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/ShowTopic-g187435-i317-k10395502-Tips_for_Car_Hire-Costa_del_Sol_Province_of_Malaga_Andalucia.html#83951907

and in summary; do a google of tripadvisor search for reviews on the operator (not just the agent), do take excess insurance (mine id £40 a year for multi-trip; as many as I like)...

... or just register for an AVIS or HERTZ loyalty card free, and pay their slightly higher rates for peace of mind. With their card you jump the queues and often get upgrades; I love that little bit of silly red carpet at the dedicated "AVIS preferred" desk at my favourite destination, Malaga, as I swan past the cheapos' 1-2 hour queue snaking back up the ramp to Arrivals!

Smug? Moi. Si! Paranoid? Si. But then I ain't been scammed in 50-60 rentals over the past 30 years either. And this is a Money Saving site!

Bon voyage

WAYT

I hope this means that you did not go forward with the booking with InterRent.

https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/ShowTopic-g189116-i1083-k4719929-o130-Car_hire_from_Faro_Airport-Faro_Faro_District_Algarve.html is up to date, so should give you an idea of who to avoid.