Car Hire UK - Cheap Car Rental Using a Broker
22 October 2007 [ad#co-1]If you were making in excess of 10,000 car rental bookings a year with a car rental company you would be expecting a discount from the standard rate. This is how car rental brokers operate. They use the combined business of all their customers to negotiate preferential rates. They then pass the savings on to their customers.
The broker will add his commission to the rate, but you will find that you will be still saving on the prices offered when dealing with the car rental company directly.
Car rental companies operate on a supply and demand basis. The busier they are prices will rise. If it is quiet the prices come down. Car rental is a seasonal business and prices normally start to climb the nearer you get to the summer months or other holiday periods like Christmas and Easter. When it is quiet the prices will come down, however the level they come down to will be similar to the rate available through a broker all year round.
There are other advantages to using a broker.
They will often have accounts with more than one car rental company. Depending on your needs they will be able to offer you the company that best meets your requirements.
Many of the brokers have a website which will allow you to book online 24 hours a day from anywhere in the world.
They can often get cars when the car rental locations are nearing capacity and have stopped selling to the public.
Prices,terms and conditions can vary.
Some will take a full payment up front and charge you a substantial amount if you cancel. Others take only a partial prepayment and do not charge you if you cancel.
You may be able to find brokers who have extras included in the booking for example a free additional driver.
In conclusion, if you want to save money on car rental, it is worth checking out the rates available through car rental brokers.
Car Insurance With Rental Car Reimbursement - Is It Worth It?
Whether you have car insurance or are shopping for a quote, you may not think about rental car reimbursement. Is it worth it? If you’re trying to save on your auto insurance, you may not want to pay for this coverage but here’s something to keep in mind.
Rental car reimbursement coverage is usually an optional add-on to your car insurance policy that will help pay for a rental car — for a limited number of days — while your vehicle is being repaired due to a loss. For example, the coverage may pay $20 per day for 30 days toward the cost of a rental car. The coverage typically costs a couple of dollars a month.
Depending on the time of year, the type of rental car, the rental car agency, where you live and other factors, you could end up paying anywhere from $25 to $75 per day for a rental car. Now consider how long it could take to repair your car. The body shop tells you three to five days. Four days later they call and tell you they had to backorder a special part. It will be another four to five days. You call five days later and they tell you the part won’t be in for another week.
Before you know it, you’ve been renting a car for almost three weeks. That could add up to several hundred dollars depending on how many days you rented the car during that period. With the rental reimbursement coverage, you would be able to pay substantially less.
I went through a similar experience as above, and ended up using the rental reimbursement coverage. For me it was worth it because I really needed to get around town and didn’t have a lot of extra cash.
You have to assess your needs and finances to decide if you should add this coverage or not to your auto policy. When you comparison shop for car insurance quotes, find out what the difference is with and without rental reimbursement coverage. You may just consider it worth it for the peace of mind.
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