Hire car collision damage waiver

[poing]

I'll be on holiday soon, in the UK, and driving around in a hire car from Enterprise. They charge quite a lot daily for the damage collision waiver so a bit of research shows a few companies that cover this for a lot less money.

The question is, what should I be looking out for with these companies and does anyone have any good or bad experience with any of them? Seems to start from £1.99 per day rather than 10 times that from the rental company.

[Chucklehead]

5 times that from the rental company.

Things to look for or be aware of:
Some don't cover cars rented within X miles of your home address.
Some don't cover windscreen or tyre damage
Some don't cover wrong fuelling the car
Some don't pay additional costs like recovery, loss of use etc
Some don't cover certain types or values of cars
Some have a maximum rental length
Some don't cover theft or loss of keys
Some don't cover if the claim isn't reported with 24 hours etc
Some don't cover more than one driver.
Some don't cover if the documents aren't received quickly enough with total claim cost. This may not seem like a problem, but for bodyshop damage you have to take in to consideration the bulk billing cycle.. the documents may not be available for 4-6 weeks.

All of them will not change the hire car company's stance that you must pay your excess on the day you damage or return the car and it is up to you to claim it back. So you'll still be out of pocket for a certain amount of time.

[poing]

Cheers for that, seems like the one I found is pretty good because it covers all that from what I can tell.

Most things will be covered by the standard insurance from the hire company, it is really just the £500 excess that I want to eliminate but not by paying over £10 per day over 15 days of hire.

Some companies have serious exclusions though looking at your list which is pretty scary!

[Ozzie Osmond]

poing said:

I want to eliminate paying an extra £10 per day for 15 days of hire.

I'd start the other end,

• How much are you paying for 15 days of car hire before the £150 is added on top?
• How many miles are you planning to drive?
• What's your total fuel cost going to be?

[poing]

Ozzie Osmond said:

poing said:

I want to eliminate paying an extra £10 per day for 15 days of hire.

I'd start the other end,

• How much are you paying for 15 days of car hire before the £150 is added on top?
• How many miles are you planning to drive?
• What's your total fuel cost going to be?

I see what you are getting at but I can't really change those very easily. I'm paying £275 for the car hire so an extra £150 seems a lot when I can get the same cover for less than £30. Miles and fuel will be the same regardless, the car is booked so also won't change. Saving £120 sounds reasonable to me and since Enterprise say it's negotiated on the day at pick up time and it's "from" £10 so could be a fair bit more. I've looked at the policy and it seems to cover all the scary get out stuff listed above so can't see why I wouldn't.

£150 isn't too bad to potentially save £500 in the case of an accident, £30 is better still. Until tonight I didn't even realise these policies existed.

[Ozzie Osmond]

By the way, I don't think you've understood the way Enterprise work. I believe their standard "excess" on car damage is £600. Their "excess waiver", if you buy it, covers damage up to £500 only. In other words, if the car suffers, say, £1,000 of damage you're still on the hook for £100. And you're on the hook for more than that if it's anything other than a standard car. See below from their website,


Excess Protection (EP)

IN THE EVENT OF DAMAGE AND OR THEFT, AN EXCESS IS APPLICABLE WHICH VARIES DEPENDING ON VEHICLE TYPE AND LOCATION. EXCESS PROTECTION WILL COVER UP TO 500 GBP OF ANY DAMAGE, SUBJECT TO TERMS AND CONDITIONS OF THE RENTAL AGREEMENT.

THE FOLLOWING EXCESS AMOUNTS APPLY; ALL CARS = 600 GBP, MINI MPVS, MPVS AND ALL VANS = 750 GBP. ALL PREMIUMS AND 4X4S = 1000 GBP.

[poing]

Ozzie Osmond said:

By the way, I don't think you've understood the way Enterprise work. I believe their standard "excess" on car damage is £600. Their "excess waiver", if you buy it, covers damage up to £500 only. In other words, if the car suffers, say, £1,000 of damage you're still on the hook for £100. And you're on the hook for more than that if it's anything other than a standard car. See below from their website,


Excess Protection (EP)

IN THE EVENT OF DAMAGE AND OR THEFT, AN EXCESS IS APPLICABLE WHICH VARIES DEPENDING ON VEHICLE TYPE AND LOCATION. EXCESS PROTECTION WILL COVER UP TO 500 GBP OF ANY DAMAGE, SUBJECT TO TERMS AND CONDITIONS OF THE RENTAL AGREEMENT.

THE FOLLOWING EXCESS AMOUNTS APPLY; ALL CARS = 600 GBP, MINI MPVS, MPVS AND ALL VANS = 750 GBP. ALL PREMIUMS AND 4X4S = 1000 GBP.

Seems like even more reason to not take out their policy and go for the separate one then.