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This
article is by an independent author and jml
Property Services takes no responsibility for its accuracy or content How
car hire rental companies try to discourage you from buying car hire excess insurance
from other sources than their provider.
By Philip
Suter When
I recently rented a car in Nice, France the car hire company Europecar wanted
to see me car hire excess insurance. This is one of the ways that a car hire rental
operator can increase its revenue from the commission paid by an insurance company. If
you have used another provider like
insurance4carhire
or Questor
(whose products are normally cheaper) you will often
find that the car hire company representative might make a comment as happened
to my son in Dublin that the policy would not cover the car properly, or have
an amount debited to your credit card. Europcar
debited €800 to my card. This also occurred with my son in Dublin recently with
Budget. This seems most unfair if say a renter is on holiday, they only have a
small credit limit on their car of £2,000 and have an outstanding balance of £500.
It would mean that with a deduction of say €800 and with Sterling still weak against
the euro there won't be much left on the card to cover accommodation, restaurants
and other spending. I
have rented cars in France on several occasions from National Citier and they
have a much fairer way of covering themselves. They do not instantly debit your
credit card and have the benefit of your money helping their cash flow, but swipe
the card so that they have information and authorisation if it is required. This
means that if you have a low credit
limit you can still go about your holiday without the fear of going over the limit
and a) having the purchase rejected or b) being penalised by a credit card company.
Buying
an annual policy from
insurance4carhire.com
or Questor
is very good value (approx £44 / £49 per year for European
cover). Research that has been carried out by insurance4carhire.com has found
that their "Daily policies" - the one sold by the car hire rental companies, cost
a lot less than those offered by the car hire rental companies. Had
I purchased a daily excess policy from insurance4carhire I would have paid £4.50
per day, with Europcar the cost would have been £10 per day and they would not
have covered windows - tyres - undercarriage like the insurance4carhire one does
When my son was in Dublin had he bought a daily excess policy from insurance4carhire
it would have cost him £4.50 per day. The cost of the Budget policy would have
been £7.53 per day and like Europcar they would not cover windows - tyres - undercarriage.
insurance4carhire have an interesting compariable car rental company excess charge
site that can be found
here.
Remember
be prepared to have your credit card debited whilst you are renting and make sure
they credit this amount back when you return the vehicle. Ensure that you have
an operational amount of credit on your card and then you will profit from the
great deals from providers like insurance4carhire
and
Questor
-
May 2009. It also pays to take out annual policies.
The
information supplied on this page is by a third party and jml Property Services
do not take any responsibility to its accuracy ©jmlpropertyservices 05/09
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