Catania Airport Car Hire

Midas

Hello all,

Taking a family holiday in Sicily in late-August, and I know I need to organise car hire but of course when you put 'car hire Sicily' into google you are immediately hit by hundreds of horror stories!

So I would be very interested to hear anyone's experiences of hiring a car from Catania airport in the last year or two - good or bad! I am trying to decide which company is least likely to cause us problems, but the reviews of all of them seem to be terrible! I'm inclined to go for one of the bigger brands so that I can book through a .co.uk website and complain to the UK office in English if necessary, but they all seem to have poor reviews so if any one has positive experiences of any of the local providers I will consider it... Also don't mind paying a bit extra for peace of mind (if there ever is such a thing with car hire!).

Many thanks in advance

EveryWhere

Why worry? Just get reputable standalone car hire excess insurance.

https://www.insurance4carhire.com are one of the longest established, to my knowledge.
https://www.quidco.com/insurance4carhire-com/

https://www.bettersafe.com/car-hire-excess-insurance also have comprehensive policies, but are a much newer company.
https://www.quidco.com/bettersafe/

But both policies have very good coverage. It often works out better to take an annual policy.

So just order your car with whomever you feel comfortable, make sure that the driver's credit card has enough of an available balance in order for a deposit authorisation to be blocked(typically 1200 euros) and your car hire excess insurance is in place.

Politely decline all offers of extra insurance and read over everything that they give you to sign. In fact it won't hurt you to write "all extra insurances declined" next to your signature and take a photo of it.

That way, no one can try to scam you by adding the insurances and then stating that you requested and signed for them.

On return, make sure that they sign off on the car before leaving the location. Any claimed damages on return, insist on a damage invoice before leaving the location. Present that to the insurance company for reimbursement.

Don't be the next 'victim' who comes on here crying, because they failed to cover themselves with a car hire excess policy. It covers much more than the car hire firm offers, even if you take their full waivers.

Midas

EveryWhere wrote: »

Why worry? Just get reputable standalone car hire excess insurance.

https://www.insurance4carhire.com are one of the longest established, to my knowledge.
https://www.quidco.com/insurance4carhire-com/

https://www.bettersafe.com/car-hire-excess-insurance also have comprehensive policies, but are a much newer company.
https://www.quidco.com/bettersafe/

But both policies have very good coverage. It often works out better to take an annual policy.

So just order your car with whomever you feel comfortable, make sure that the driver's credit card has enough of an available balance in order for a deposit authorisation to be blocked(typically 1200 euros) and your car hire excess insurance is in place.

Politely decline all offers of extra insurance and read over everything that they give you to sign. In fact it won't hurt you to write "all extra insurances declined" next to your signature and take a photo of it.

That way, no one can try to scam you by adding the insurances and then stating that you requested and signed for them.

On return, make sure that they sign off on the car before leaving the location. Any claimed damages on return, insist on a damage invoice before leaving the location. Present that to the insurance company for reimbursement.

Don't be the next 'victim' who comes on here crying, because they failed to cover themselves with a car hire excess policy. It covers much more than the car hire firm offers, even if you take their full waivers.

Yep, I've always bought excess insurance in the past, and will certainly do so again - I actually once had to claim on the excess insurance and it was a relatively painless process.

My point I suppose is that I don't know who I am 'comfortable' hiring from, mainly as I've hired cars in Italy many times before and found the service offered by different branches of the same company to vary massively. So I'm interested to hear any experiences people might have of the local offices in Catania...