Were You Taken For A Ride This Summer?

Overcharged?

Were you taken for a ride when you hired your rental car this summer? As far as a report in the Daily Mail newspaper in June this year is concerned, the chances are pretty high that you may have been.

Fuelling

The principal target of the story was the growing tendency for hire car companies to charge customers for a full tank of petrol when collecting the car and then requesting that the vehicle is returned with an empty tank.
 
Of course, it is practically impossible to achieve that empty tank of petrol and the car rental company simply pockets what you have paid in the first place and then charges the next customer for a full tank of fuel too.
 
The scam is made all the worse because hire car companies typically charge up to 75% more than local petrol stations according to three-quarters of the British holidaymakers surveyed.

Insurance

Unfortunately, refuelling policies are not the only ways in which hire car companies may try to part you from your hard-earned cash.
 
The sale of insurance cover is another frequently observed attempt to persuade you to pay for the protection you may be certain to need.
 
The culprit, in this case, is excess insurance cover to protect you from excess charges that might rise to £2,000 following each accident, or considerably more if you happen to have hired a particularly high-end vehicle.
 
Rental companies may tend to trade on this vulnerability and charge a significant daily rate to provide excess insurance in view of this peril. These policies also have exclusions to what areas of the vehicle is covered, typically the roof, undercarriage, tyres and windscreen - so the policy is not as comprehensive as it could be.
 
What the rental companies do not point out of course is that this cover is readily available as an entirely standalone policy before you even set out on your travels. UK-based specialists such as those of us here at Bettersafe, that has an established reputation for providing everything you may need by way of excess insurance. And at a price, you are likely to find considerably more competitive than that bought from a hire car company.
 
Our policies also cover those areas excluded by some other excess insurance cover, the aforementioned tyres, windscreen, roof and undercarriage.

Extras

In addition to what might seem like a conspiracy surrounding refuelling charges and what is likely to be a hard sell when it comes to additional insurance, there are other ways rental companies may increase the cost of hiring a car.
 
Favourites are the hire of child seats – for which a considerable daily rental may be charged for what is an essential item when travelling with children and the hire of satnav devices, which are unlikely to be considered quite so essential.
 
The way of avoiding potentially rip-off charges for items such as this may be simply to take them along with you. Modern child seats are typically designed to fit any car and may be secured within seconds, whilst your own GPS – with the appropriate up to date maps  - may again be used in any vehicle you choose to rent, practically anywhere in the world.
 
Forewarned is forearmed as the saying goes, so next time you set off on your holidays and are looking to hire a car, remember the points mentioned above. They could save you a serious amount of money.