How to Rent a Car and Not Get Ripped Off
Renting a car can often be an expensive proposition. If you’re on vacation, or your car is stuck in the shop getting repaired, you can get stuck paying quite a bit of money renting a car. Fortunately with some due diligence, there’s ways that you can make renting a car much less expensive. Here are some tips to save money on car rentals.
Broken Car? – If your vehicle is at the dealership or in the shop getting fixed, ask if they have a courtesy car that you can borrow. Quite often the place fixing your car will let you borrow one of theirs while your vehicle is getting fixed. When my 95 intrepid was in the shop, the local dealership lent me an ’04 Alero to drive around, and didn’t’ even charge me for it! Not every dealership will be this nice, but it doesn’t hurt to ask, and it sure beats paying for a rental car!
Weekly Rate – In most cases, you won’t be able to borrow a car for free, so if you do have to rent a car, ask about getting a weekly rate. The discount often makes renting a vehicle for a week cheaper than renting a car for five or six days. It might make sense to hold onto the vehicle for an extra day to save some money.
Discounts – Ask the car rental place what sort of discounts they have. A lot of rental companies offer discounts to AAA members and members of other organizations such as the AARP.
Corporate Rates – A lot of larger companies can get a corporate discount. Check with your HR or travel department and see if you’re allowed to get the corporate rate for personal rentals. Be sure to check what it would cost you normally though, sometimes the corporate rate is higher than what you or I would normally pay.
Fill Up The Tank – When you’re done using the vehicle, make sure to fill up the tank to where it was when you got it. Most rental companies charge upwards of a $4.00 per gallon fee to refill the tank! Don’t over fill it though, otherwise you’ll end up paying too much that way too.
Insurance – Make sure that your car insurance covers your usage of a rental car before going. If you think that you’re covered and end up not being covered, you’re exposing yourself to huge amounts of risk and liability. Make sure that your insurance is in order to avoid some very costly bills if you were to get in an accident.
Last Minute Rentals – Quite often car rental companies will lie to try to boost their sales. Sometimes they’ll say they only have full-sized vehicles when they have plenty of less expensive vehicles to go around. If you go in the store, they might lie to you, but their website will be honest.
Take Pictures When Returning – When you return your vehicle, use your cell-phone camera, a digital camera, or a disposable camera and take a few quick pictures of the exterior of the vehicle. This way you’ll have proof that you returned the car in good condition. Car rental companies will take a quick look at the car when you return it, but the contract will say that they have the right to go back later and say it doesn’t. If you have proof that you returned it in good condition, they can’t come back later and try to extort money from you.