I need to rent a car from the Melbourne airport to drive down to Warranambool. Never hired a car before so would appreciate some advice.
Are there any current offers that you guys know of? I want to get it on a Friday morning end of July and return on a Monday afternoon. I am paranoid about damaging it and having to pay huge amounts in insurance excess! Anycheap way to avoid that? Which agency is the most reliable?
Thanks
I second this advice. We did this last year. We took out travel insurance which covered us in the event that we had to pay the $3000 excess (for a $50 claim fee). This was much cheaper than the extra cover offered by the car hire place. When we picked up the car, we checked it for any pre-existing damage. There were a couple of scratches near the boot, but the staff showed us a sign with the types of marks and scratches they don't worry about - minor wear and tear seems to be ok, but we took photos just in case.
We found the best deal we could get at the time was through our frequent flyers membership. Good luck!
I also have used travel insurance to reduce excess. I had to make a claim after using a bollard in a tight hotel carpark as a door-can-opener. It was a really easy process which was concluded under a week. I think it was Travel Insurance Direct http://www.travelinsurancedirect.com.au . 10% Discount vouchers can be googled or found on OzB.
I rent cars almost fortnightly/monthly as I travel allot for work, I've really only ever had 3 MINOR problems in 5 years of doing this.
1) AVIS Brisbane tried to sting me for petrol (you have to pay something like $2.40 per litre if you don't return it full), I had to scan and send them my fuel receipt to prove I purchased fuel 2 mins before returning the car at the servo at the airport.
2) AVIS Darwin, up in Darwin they seem to have KM allowances (Sydney, Central Coast, Sunshine Coast, Brisbane, Adelaide seem to have unlimted Kms included) - Anyway they tried to sting me for using several hundred km over the included amount, again I had to show them a fuel receipt proving I used about 9 litres of fuel in a Toyota Corolla which I rented for 5 hours, this was reasonable proof I only traveled about 100km in total.
3) Virgin cancelled a flight on me ex-sunshine coast, I had to quickly rent a car and drive to Brisbane to catch a flight out that night, Budget were all out of cars apart from a minivan that had just been returned but not cleaned etc, I agreed to take it - drove straight to Brisbane airport (about 95km), when I arrived, they tried to pin a giant dent on me…. I ended up calling the Sunny Coast branch direct on my mobile (as BNE staff wouldn't believe me) and the manager at Sunshine Coast sorted it out.
My thoughts:
1) Insurance is a rip off (something like $20-30 per day), for me I work the excess to be equivalent to about 100 rental days. So if I crash less than 1:100 days (which is about 1 year of rentals for me) I am better off, so far touch wood 5 years no accidents.
2) Always check the car over before leaving, if they don't ask you to sign off on the damage inspection form - skip this step. 50% of the time the staff are too busy or lazy to even bother with it (they may just do it less for corporate customers)
3) Check the car is full when you collect it - I have collected cars on 95% full before, only to have to bring them back to full on return.
4) Pre-book the car, prices at the airport are a rip off (heaps of codes available if you look online / entertainment book etc)
5) When you refill before returning keep your TAX invoice (not eftpos receipt)
6) Always rent the smallest cheapest car you can handle (I usually get the smallest auto hatch possible) usually (50-66% of the time) you'll get an upgrade as everyone always wants the smallest auto hatch and airport locations always run out of them and will roll you up to the next class. Also if you are a real Ozbargainer rent the smallest auto hatch WITH a baby seat, usually the baby seats are in Subaru Forester type cars and the staff wont be bothered taking it out of that car to put it in the Hyunday i20 you actually rented - you get the Forester for the same price! (I have taken my family on a few trips and this has resulted a decent upgrade everytime - Forester, Statesman, Xtrail etc)
7) You can cancel most bookings without penalty, so even if you book with 1 provider then stumble on to a better deal you can move on.
I rented a car in Adelaide recently and I used Economy Car Rentals (economycarrentals.com), which includes CDW however you still have to pay the first $3000 or so (gulp!). So, to cover that I took out domestic travel insurance with Columbus Direct Travel (columbusdirect.com.au) which brought down the excess to $125. I did quite a bit of research and chose both of those companies based on price and what was covered.
Thanks guys.
Rented from Avis. There was a $30 off coupon which brought down the price for 3+ days to $110. Happy! Can always change if I find a better deal.
bump..
Glad it worked out for the OP. Another renter newb here.
I wanna go melbourne to adelaide with some 'gear'. Wanna travel Sept/Oct.. how long for.. maybe a week.. tips? deals going? Car size not important, I'm guessing if its a hatch back seat and passenger for the gear or go sedan or if I can ozbargain something better as mentioned, thx
check our arguscarhire and look for vehicles with full cover.
Vroom vroom vroom always gets me best deals with big names cheaper than the small players.
Usualy book a micra or similar with avis or budget but get an i30 or corolla given to me.
thanks for the advice!
You can get a policy with 1Cover for domestic travel insurance which covers rental vehicle excess, should work out cheaper than paying the exorbitant excess reductions. http://www.1cover.com.au/
Normally small companies are significantly cheaper than the big names. Don't know if any operate out of the airport though.