Car Hire in the UK and Ireland

[lovetravellingoz]

I am currently getting my head around car hire in Ireland and the UK where I will have at least three car hires in May and June 2018.

From my reading their have been a lot of complaints about hiring cars in Ireland in particular.

So after reading up avidly on this forum and others my current thoughts and understandings are:

If I have understood the various blogs and consumer forums correctly though there does however seem to be a lot of confusion, and in part a lot of that seems to be to me that many hirers from the USA have credit card insurance which covers them in the USA for collision damage, but it does not provide this same cover in places like Ireland. This group get annoyed when they arrive at their hire thinking that their card will provide CDW in Ireland which most cards will not do.

The credit card insurance that many that we in Australia is not car insurance so much as rental car excess insurance. ie it just covers the gap, and their needs to be comprehensive insurance in place (ie the CDW) as it only insures the excess. The various CC Insurance brochures I have read for various Australian issued cards indicate this. Essentially this type of cover is the "Super Cover" however not that if you use your card if there is any damage the hirer will need to pay for the damage and then seek re-imbursement from your Credit Card Insurance (ie so the disadvantage here is if their is damage or the need to claim that you the hirer will have to do some extra legwork). So that is a disadvantage along with the along with the 3000 od Euro hold on your CC. Though for me this second point is not a disadvantage as the CC I will use for car hires will have ample credit on it (one due the cards limit, and secondly I will only use it for car hirers as other cards are better for me for international transactions).

However the Aust. CC Excess insurance does not cover tyres, glass and undercarriage either (ie most super Covers do not either).

But you can cover yourself for BOTH the Super Cover and Tyre and Glass through providers like www.icarhireinsurance.com and at a much cheaper cost per day that through car rental firm or car rental agent.

Indeed policies such as this cover extras that the Super cover does not:

What's Covered

• Excess fees charged by the rental company - up to £6,000
• Damage to body work including tyres, windscreen, roof and undercarriage
• Damage caused by fire and vandalism
• Reimburses you if charged an excess for your vehicle being stolen
• Towing, breakdown, lock out and misfuelling excess charges
• Hotel and travel expenses relating to loss of use of your rental vehicle
• Main driver and additional drivers, so long as they’re named on the rental contract
• Covers rentals up to 65 days in length
• Admin fees relating to excess charges are also covered

The other plus for this type of excess cover is if you do multiple hires that effectively they are free. Daily cover is 2.99 Pound, but 12 month cover is only 37.99 Pound.


Now I note that some people have stated that car rental firms tell some hirers that they need to see the card insurance etc, or can refuse it. But however as I understand it while this is true for refusing CDW, that once you have taken the basic CDW coverage that you can happily refuse the Supercover etc and not have to justify to them why etc. YOU just need to satisfy yourself that you are happy with whatever CC or Third Party Insurance you have for excess cover etc, or indeed that you are happy to self-insure. That is your decision and not the rental firms, despite what they may say to try and pressure a sale. You may of course decide to go with the hirer cost Super Cover and Glass/Tyre Cover due to its simplicity.

However one potential extra cost is if the rental does not just ring-fence the deposit – if not there can be an exchange rate risk. Some firms just ring-fence the deposit (which means you can't spend that amount until it's released) whereas others I have read including Alamo, Enterprise, Hertz and National, may actually withdraw the deposit when you take the car and refund it later. This means if there are big currency fluctuations while renting you may be affected – Of course it can also work in your favour too.


So in summary what I am currently intending to do for my hires in England, Ireland and Scotland is:

- Book Car Rental with LLI Insurance and CDW Insurance included. - Based on quotes to date these included insurances are very cheap.
- Pay via my ANZ Black so have rental excess insurance
- But will also take out a 12 month policy with www.icarhireinsurance.com which belts an braces with the ANZ cover, but which also provides coverage for items that the ANZ does not

I am more likely to book direct at present - but will seek quotes from some car rental agents to see if they can better the deal. But so far I do have access to a very cheap corporate rate through Hertz, though for Ireland Dan Dooleys is cheaper for my dates, cars and route and especially if you do not start the hire in Dublin.


I would be interested in others experiences and thoughts.


READING:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/...y-Ill-never-buy-car-hire-insurance-again.html
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/a...hen-will-rental-companies-sort-their-act-out/



http://www.money.co.uk/excess-insurance/car-hire-excess-insurance.htm (note that some companies will only cover UK residents)

 

[kpc]

I hired directly from Europcar in 2015. €1600 block on my credit card was released after 10 days; http://www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au/community/car-hire-taxis-and-limos/car-hire-dublin-6-days-64578.html
[TABLE="width: 560"] [TR] [TD]Details of your rate [/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]
[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]Price includes [/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]
[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]
[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]

• CDW Liability / excess: AUD 2633.26 excluding tax

[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD]

• T(H)W Liability / excess: AUD 2633.26 excluding tax

[/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE]

 

[lovetravellingoz]

So far for England, Ireland and Scotland the rates I am getting are quite low. scotland wil probably be with Hertz as I have access to an excellent corporate rate. England will probably be Avis simply as while Herts is cheaper, that where I want to drop off the car the nearest Hertz is 45 minutes by train away!

For Ireland for example a 5 night /6 day day rental with Dan Dooleys in can be as cheap as: 106 Euro plus 24 Euro for CDW +LLI (130 Euro in total), topped up with the Excess Europe Policy (37.99 Pound and so say 13 Pound for this rental). So about 140 Euro all up.

One -way one drop offs are more, and hires starting in Dublin are more as well whenever I have searched. Flying into Shannon and returning in Dublin is a lot cheaper than starting and finishing in Dublin from the searches I have done to date. One way from Shannon to Dublin was 50 Euro.

That is for a manual and for only a single driver for a compact diesel. C1.

One negative is that they charge for a full tank of fuel on pick-up with no refunds for any fuel in the tank on drop off (Ie you can drop it off empty, but if say half full you just do your money). So will lose a small amount of $$ there.


PS: The bulk of the advice for hiring a car in Ireland is to go small due the narrow roads.

 

[Bilton]

There seems to be a lot of YMMV experiences with Irish car hire, but after reading literally hundreds of on-line messages on the topic, I decided to just go with the Super Damage Waiver level of cover from the rental car company. While it is possible to use third party insurance, there are some real horror stories regarding the difficulties of getting the coverage accepted at the point of hire and/or asserting a claim.

We are hiring an Auto VW Golf from Europcar using a Accor 10% discount code, including taking one extra driver and the cross-border fee for Northern Ireland. Europcar has told me that their particular SCDW covers everything, including windscreens, tyres, underbody etc etc, so there wont be any arguments when we return the vehicle.

The 12 day hire it is going cost EU956 (~AUD1400) but at least I wont be worrying about any extra costs coming back to bite us.

For the UK, we are doing a one-way hire from Holyhead to Ashford International (Eurostar) station. While several many rental car companies serve the Holyhead ferry terminal on a Meet & Greet basis, only one has a depot at at Ashford, so we are again going with Europcar.

There are additional site fees at both ends of the rental but this time I'm prepared to wear them. We are getting a Mercedes C Class, as we have a ~7 hour motorway haul to get to Devon from Holyhead so comfort is definitely highly desirable. The 6 day hire, with additional driver and Premium Protection Package comes out at GBP486 (~AUD800).

I'll report back towards the end of the year on how it turned out.

 

[lovetravellingoz]

There seems to be a lot of YMMV experiences with Irish car hire, but after reading literally hundreds of on-line messages on the topic, I decided to just go with the Super Damage Waiver level of cover from the rental car company. While it is possible to use third party insurance, there are some real horror stories regarding the difficulties of getting the coverage accepted at the point of hire and/or asserting a claim.
.

From what I can gather once you get the CDW cover included with the rental:

1/ That then onnce you have agreed to the excess and given authority for rental company to deduct that excess for damage etc from a credit card there actually is nothing that the rental company has to approve with third party excess coverage ( The issues more seem to be where the hirer wants to use card Insurance to replace the CDW and they have arrived with no CDW coverage booked) as once you have the CDW it is really the size of the excess you are arguing about. Also the supercover will not include all items anyway. Getting third party excess insurance coverage is to the rental company really no different to to the hier just deciding to bare their own risk with the excess. As per the advice on the issue I will just decline the Supercover and not advise them of that I have third party coverage. I appreciate they may and try and upsell me supercover, but I will just decline with a smile.

2/ That if you need to claim on the excess amount that you are not actually dealing with the rental company, but rather with your third party insurer (and the reviews of the the right third party insurers are excellent. You simply pay whatever the excess is to the rental company in full (or rather they just deduct it), and you then put your claim in with your third party insurer.




Whereas if the hirer declines the rental companies CDW the rental company can quite rightly demand to see what insurance will cover their car. I mean would you hire your vehicle to a stranger merely on the their would that they have adequate collision coverage?

Not using the rental firms CDW (Also call CDI = collision Damage Insurance) is a much larger can of worms.

Also the CDW cost is not a big component of the hire anyway and so one would save little by avoiding it. and in many cases the cost of the Admin Fee charged if CDW is waived would be larger than the CDW Fee anyway! (Ie. An administration charge of €30/UK£25 per rental applies if the customer opts to decline our Insurance Products. See section 4.1 above for CDI Waiver Deposit required.)

 

[dajop]

We rented last year on the island of Ireland (as opposed to the country of Ireland) and it was one of the more complicated rentals I've undertaken. It took some hours to understand the different pitfalls and charges of the different rental policies. We did solve the insurance issue by ensuring the rental had CDW included, and taking out further excess reduction insurance with a company similar to that you linked in your first post.

We did complicate the matter by picking up the car in Belfast (and ended up deciding to return there rather than Dublin as well, to save on the significant relocation fee & take advantage of lower airfares to MAN, but cost us an extra 1:45 of driving). This meant watching out for cross border fees (from UK to Ireland), which varied depending on the rental company and ranged from a mere 10 GBP per rental to something like 20 GBP per day, for the entire rental, and everything in between). If not travelling into Northern Ireland, then that is not a problem though. If you are, something to check in the fine print.

The other watchout was fuel- as you point out. Some it seemed do as we do in Australia - pick up full, return full. Others charged for a full tank on pickup - which I know you can do your money if you don't use all the fuel - but the real watchout here is what they charge for the full tank ... some charged more than double of what it would cost to fill the car (ie. the per litre rate was twice that typically charged by petrol stations in the area). Numerous online reviews indicated people were caught out by this - not the requirement to pay for full tank of fuel per se, but the rate at which it was charged.

So having done all that, sorted it all out, picked a reasonable rental etc, our plane from LHR arrived in Belfast City 25 mins late, which put us about 10 mins past the "closing" time of the rental agency and they wanted to charge us a 50GBP "after hours" surcharge. So instead we took a taxi to hotel and I returned the next morning buy bus to pick it up the vehicle, as the airport is very close to town. It was a matter of principle!

Oh on the small car thing, I wouldn't worry too much about having a small car, after all the widths of most cars are similar (+/- what 20 cm). However as much as I love changing gears when accelerating out of bends, etc, I rapidly tired of it, and wished we'd rented an automatic, as the roads are windy, there is a lot of slower traffic (mainly other tourists I think, particularly those not so comfortable driving on left side of the road .....) and I was constantly changing gears for most of the journey (at least until getting onto the motorway back to Dublin).

 

[lovetravellingoz]

We did complicate the matter by picking up the car in Belfast (and ended up deciding to return there rather than Dublin as well, to save on the significant relocation fee & take advantage of lower airfares to MAN, but cost us an extra 1:45 of driving). This meant watching out for cross border fees (from UK to Ireland), which varied depending on the rental company and ranged from a mere 10 GBP per rental to something like 20 GBP per day, for the entire rental, and everything in between). If not travelling into Northern Ireland, then that is not a problem though. If you are, something to check in the fine print.

.

Yes I had picked up on that too. One advantage of Dan's is:

3.6 Cross Border Driving:Unlike many other companies, Dooley Car Rentals does not charge additional fees for cross border driving (except in the case of one way rentals).


I am still tossing up on route and length of car hire of anywhere from 5 to 10 days. We may or may not include Northern Island in the driving part.

The SW/W of Ireland we will definitely want to visit by car.

We are departing Island from Dublin bu ship and so will finish in Dublin. We can get very cheap flights from Scotland to virtually any Island airport though.


The advance purchase train ticket for Belfast-Dublin is only 17.99 Pound pp and so one option is that we may fly into Belfast where it is easy to get around town without a car. Do a day trip to the Giants Causeway and GoT locations. And when down south do our car touring. Or to doa circuit by car like you from Belfast and then just finish in Dublin by catching the train there.

 

[lovetravellingoz]

Thanks for all your feedback.

Oh on the small car thing, I wouldn't worry too much about having a small car, after all the widths of most cars are similar (+/- what 20 cm). However as much as I love changing gears when accelerating out of bends, etc, I rapidly tired of it, and wished we'd rented an automatic, as the roads are windy, there is a lot of slower traffic (mainly other tourists I think, particularly those not so comfortable driving on left side of the road .....) and I was constantly changing gears for most of the journey (at least until getting onto the motorway back to Dublin).

We will not go for the tiny car. Partly so is not too underpowered, but also as handling our luggage is much easier.

While I own two cars, I mainly drive my manual at home as I just enjoy driving manuals

And the vast majority of my international rentals have been manuals. Including our African trip when we drove 4800km from Nairobi to Victoria Falls.

Plus unlike last year in France this trip will all be on the side of the road that I am used too.



Most of the reported "horror" stories seem in the main seem to be posted to people from the USA who see to struggle with the difference between diesel and petrol, manuals rather than automatics, driving on the left and the CDW/Supercover issue where they do not appreciate the difference between collision cover, and then having excess cover which for those in the USA is call Refundable Deuctibles.

Indeed one quite amusing thread that I read was were an american was complaining about the Irish calling deductibles an excess, and then post after post from around the world commenting that well where they were from (insert country ) called it an excess as well and that it was only the USA that called it a deductible.

 

[Bilton]

2/ That if you need to claim on the excess amount that you are not actually dealing with the rental company, but rather with your third party insurer...

From my point of view, its much more straightforward to deal with the rental company. YMMV

 

[dajop]

While I own two cars, I mainly drive my manual at home as I just enjoy driving manuals

And the vast majority of my international rentals have been manuals. Including our African trip when we drove 4800km from Nairobi to Victoria Falls.
Plus unlike last year in France this trip will all be on the side of the road that I am used too.

Oh, I enjoy driving a manual too, and most of my international rentals have been manuals too. Including Namibia, UK, Albania, Montenegro and various other places. I've found in Europe the cost can be as low as one quarter the cost of renting an automatic so it leaves money to spend on other things . However, perhaps as we only had a few days and it was summer (so the days were long), it was the first place I've really tired of it. But if I'd been happy pottering along at 40-50 kph, like most tourists, it would not have been a problem

 

[OZDUCK]

I have already had some discussion with the OP about this matter on another thread.

To add to that discussion, we hired a VW Golf which was fine for the 2 of us with 1 medium & 1 large suitcase plus a couple of backpacks & a tote bag (one suitcase had to go onto the back seat but that was the same with a Jeep Cherokee in Canada). On the west coast I would not have wanted a bigger car.

It was a manual and I must admit that on a couple of days - especially around the Ring of Kerry and Dingle Peninsula - my knees were sore at the end of the day from the constant gear changes. However, the jump up to an automatic was excessive when I made my booking.

 

[lovetravellingoz]

From my point of view, its much more straightforward to deal with the rental company. YMMV

Well yes, and I appreciate that some people simply do not want the extra complication or fuss. But it is also more straightforward to just buy International flights rather than acquire points and then redeem flights. And indeed with most of my travels, straightforward is not my norm. ie When trekking in Nepal I find my own guide and porter rather sign on board a trekking trip.

We each have own trade offs for time, ease and cost. And like most travel decisions there is not one right answer, or only one path.


And also in all of my rentals in many countries to date obera 30 year period I have never had a claim or excess deduction. Not saying it will not happen here, but my trend would indicate that it is less likely than likely. And also based on that 40 Pound Premium for excess cover it would also seem to me that the odds of making a claim are not high.

So unless I make a claim, a few minutes at most completing the excess insurance online is no biggie. This trip I will have three car rentals and so it will a sizable sum to take out supercover three times.

Plus also the extra excess cover actually covers more things than most of the Supercovers do and so I will actually have a higher level of protection/coverage.

 

[AV8]

Having returned recently from Ireland and renting a vehicle from Hertz Dublin Airport (through Argus) I was extremely pis..d off when collecting the vehicle to be told that I had only basic insurance cover despite the fact that the Argus booking stated that CDW, TW, Third Party Liability, Breakdown assistance etc was included in my pre paid voucher. To avoid any costs should I damage the vehicle the Hertz agent proceeded with the upselling of additional cover at which I respectfully declined and was then advised that a $3000 euro charge would be held on my credit card otherwise the vehicle could not be released - charge on card was OK'd (but not happy Jan) - this experience at the start of my Irish holiday left a sour taste in my mouth and I have serious doubts as to whether I will ever return to Ireland. The vehicle return was a total bun fight with Hertz operating from a new location (not the same yard as collection) and there are still serious teething problems (good news no additional charges applied).

 

[lovetravellingoz]

Also on my route I keep changing my mind.

But will probably go by the Less is More maxim and mainly do west and sw coasts with lots of time for walking and exploring and to not have to spend too much time driving, which if we try and incorporate NI too would probably be the case since we will probably spend only ten nights all up in Ireland.

 

[lovetravellingoz]

Having returned recently from Ireland and renting a vehicle from Hertz (through Argus) I was extremely pis..d off when collecting the vehicle to be told that I had only basic insurance cover despite the fact that the Argus booking stated that CDW, TW, Third Party Liability, Breakdown assistance etc was included in my pre paid voucher. To avoid any costs should I damage the vehicle the Hertz agent proceeded with the upselling of additional cover at which I respectfully declined and was then advised that a $3000 euro charge would be held on my credit card otherwise the vehicle could not be released - charge on card was OK'd (but not happy Jan) - this experience at the start of my Irish holiday left a sour taste in my mouth and I have serious doubts as to whether I will ever return to Ireland. The vehicle return was a total bun fight with Hertz operating from a new location (not the same yard as collection) and there are still serious teething problems (good news no additional charges applied).

Hertz does seem to in Ireland have a particularly bad reputation and so at present I will not use them there. Though I will most likely use them in Scotland.

 

[Hvr]

I used my TI cover for the hire car in the UK last year and didn't need to claim.

One thing I did find was that the cost of including a GPS was usurious.

It would've cost £100 to hire for the week, opposed to buying one from Argy's for £50.
I donated it to a charity once I finished my driving.

 

[AV8]

Hertz does seem to in Ireland have a particularly bad reputation and so at present I will not use them there. Though I will most likely use them in Scotland.

I also had a serious issue with Hertz SFO Airport (Argus booking) on this same trip - they had lost my booking (new computer system apparently) and would not honour my pre paid voucher for the $ amount - Hertz wanted to charge me an additional $300+ US based on manually entering my booking into the system - I calmly asked to speak to a supervisor who honoured the Argus booking - I always have a hard copy of the voucher with my travel papers.

Hertz Franchise Partner Ryan's Investments Will Operate Hertz, Dollar And Thrifty In Ireland Until 2024

 

[lovetravellingoz]

I used my TI cover for the hire car in the UK last year and didn't need to claim.

One thing I did find was that the cost of including a GPS was usurious.

It would've cost £100 to hire for the week, opposed to buying one from Argy's for £50.
I donated it to a charity once I finished my driving.

I still have the Tom Tom I bought last year as it also had included free World Maps as well as Australia/NZ which I used in France last year.

 

[PLANT]

So book via rentalcars.com and get small manual for Ireland.
Use travel insurance policy to cover car hire insurance. Credit card will be charged holding fee..... How much?
Which car hire company to look at hiring car from Dublin-Dublin 2 weeks?
Better to pickup airport and drop off or is there a better option?

 

[OZDUCK]

So book via rentalcars.com and get small manual for Ireland.
Use travel insurance policy to cover car hire insurance. Credit card will be charged holding fee..... How much?
Which car hire company to look at hiring car from Dublin-Dublin 2 weeks?
Better to pickup airport and drop off or is there a better option?

If you haven't already done so, you should read the TripAdvisor Irish forum for all the interesting times you can have hiring cars in Ireland. It does give you an idea which companies seem to be best.

I used Conns Ireland earlier this year with no problems and no CC holding fee. Includes "SuperCover' insurance which came in useful after some fun with a tour bus occupying 90% of the road on "The Ring of Kerry" - most quotes don't include this. Included a "free" GPS - which admittedly was a Hertz TomTom GPS and not a great one. .

As we spent 4 nights in Dublin I picked up from "South" Dublin and dropped off at the Airport for a small fee. It was only a short taxi ride to the depot - on the South Circular Road and very convenient to start our trip to Cork. The car was a nice Diesel Manual Golf which had a Rear-View Camera and Radar Cruise Control. Around €620 for 19 days.We paid a bit extra for wheel & tyre insurance, about €50 i think.

On departure we stopped at a B&B near to the airport as we had an early flight out.

http://www.connsirelandcarrental.co...ail&utm_term=0_040767bb5e-04d966cfd8-91639353