Car hire in Spain...

I flew into Alicante on holiday last year. Hired a car from Centauro - was a bit dubious as I'd never hired a car before, let alone abroad, but the experience was pretty hassle free. Cant remember the pricing, fuel policy, etc but I might be able to dig them out when I get home.
 
[TW]Fox;24720213 said:
Just avoid all the local firms, book online with a major. You know what you are going get that way - and purchase excess protection insurance in the UK for a trivial amount of money.
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Even the biggies can throw a surprise sometimes.

I flew into Barcelona Friday night with Easyjet and had a car pre-booked with their 'partners' Europcar. This was booked via a link on the Easyjet booking confirmation email back in March. On arrival at the Europcar desk we were told that the booking only came with 3rd party insurance and that in Spain the legal mandatory is this plus collinsion and theft cover, something I naturally assumed we would automatically have. We were then told this would be an extra €661!!

Suffice to say we kicked up a huge stink but at 11pm there is not much assistance available and pretty stressful with 3 kids desperate to get to bed. We ended up taking out a new hire car agreement as this was cheaper than paying the additional insurance surcharge. I now have a nice dispute with Easyjet to look forward to on our return to try and find out what the hell happened. They explictly state on the Easyjet/Europcar website that 'We’ll never hit you with unexpected extra charges when you arrive'....

So make sure whoever you hire with have full insurance!
 
Booked our hire car in Sardinia this morning with Hertz. Was a little more than other companies but I wanted peace of mind by going with a reputable company that I'd heard of, and I booked it through topcashback.
 
Ive rented a car in Kefalonia in Greece twice now and found that using the tour operators recommended local company has always been the easiest and by far the cheapest. Both companies i went with were so laid back, the insurance was zero excess and basically you didn't have to pay anything if either you or someone else wrecked the car. They don't even bother checking the car much before or after you get it/hand it back. Both times (and it was a different company each time) were trouble free and very cheap.

With fuel they just said hand it back with the roughly the same that it came with.

Prices for booking through Hertz e.t.c before leaving were hilarious in comparison.
 
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Thats fine for Greece but Spain is notorious for enormous tourist carhire ripoff scams - especially with local operators.

The answer is clearly to go to North America instead where you can hire an enormous luxury saloon for next to nothing, fully insured :p
 
[TW]Fox;24727216 said:
The answer is clearly to go to North America instead where you can hire an enormous luxury saloon for next to nothing, fully insured :p
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I intend to do this at some point in the near future :D
 
[TW]Fox;24727115 said:
http://www.insurance4carhire.com

Now book a policy through these guys and you are all set.
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I can recommend this excess company , paid out around £130 no problem when my car got keyed in Spain.

Declined all the insurances with Hertz and Hertz charged my credit card, took only a few days to get payment back via a direct transfer.

Also sign up with Hertz Gold, the feeling of smugness when you skip the hour long queue and the disgusted looks on people faces when they thought they would be next is really satisfying.
 
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