Car rental in US

One advice I can give you is if you book it online in advance and they don't have your type of car in they'll usually bump it up to the next highest level free of charge. I've done that many a time.

I always take whatever insurance they offer as well. Last time I rented a truck some people called in and complained that I side-swiped every car along this street I never went on. They told me if I didn't have insurance that I would be fucked, in other words of course.

Booking a car online will most likely be cheaper, but that can depend on the company you are going through for rental. Car insurance is bought through the rental place through their insurance policies. Just make sure you have your driver license (or international driver's license) and a CC or debit card.

Ya, booking in advance is usually cheaper and most major airports in the US have car rental facilities on site. It also sounds like you're going to be driving from Vegas to Los Angeles? If you do, make sure you check what their policy/fee is for dropping the car off at a different rental facility.

Yeah I should mention they will try to gouge you with fees at every turn, depending on the company. Most airports have the location either inside the airport or provide transportation via a bus or some other means to the location - so try to take advantage of that. Almost every car rental service I've used has been pretty good, with the exception of the truck. BTW, the truck had no damage, but basically if someone files that claim they get paid no matter what.. I feel it is a common scam as the guy didn't express much anger and kind of had a "this always happens" tone - at least once he found out I had insurance.

Not sure how it is in other countries, but you have to be a certain age to rent a car in the US (23, 26? something). Just make sure the person renting is old enough (i don't know how old you are).

Also don't forget to fill up the gastank just before you turn it in, or they will charge you like 2x retail for the missing fuel (esp in California,which has some of the highest gas prices in the U.S.). Just be mindful of the nearest gas station to the rental place ;P

If you're foreign grab the insurance option unless you use a credit card that covers you properly. Book online and enjoy your visit.

always grab the car insurance from the rental company, although many credit cards and auto policies cover damages it is a real pain in the ass dealing with it, literally days of your life will be spent trying to get it all sorted and the rental company tries really hard to fuck you over doing things like charging a daily "you had an accident and the car isnt repaired" fee and shit. There are now multiple levels of insurance though, get only the one that covers car damage and stuff, you don't need the next tier which covers any medical costs, lost wages, crap like that.

las vegas airport rentals can be hella cheap, since 99% of people renting barely drive in vegas. However, thats only if you return to the same airport. Once you start doing a vegas to LA thing the costs can absolutely skyrocket. Make sure you look at multiple scenarios, including renting in vegas for a week (and returning to vegas) and then having a 1 or 2 day rental from vegas to LA, or even its possible that renting and returning to vegas and then flying to LA and renting a new car there could be cheaper (yeah its weird).

there are tons of coupons also for rentals, use something like fatwallet.com or slickdeals.net to look at good deals. Can discount up to 50% easy.

Kedwyn_sl said:

If you're foreign grab the insurance option unless you use a credit card that covers you properly. Book online and enjoy your visit.

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Many (most?) CCs will cover your insurance needs. Hey, get more if you like but in most instances you are just throwing money away for fun.

I get having extra insurance when traveling in south america or africa or whatever but in NA you are pretty much good to go with your CC's coverage. At least that's what I've always been told and I rent a *lot*. It might be a corporate thing I suppose but I'm doing it on my own CC and although I've never hit and killed anyone stateside yet, it is only a matter of time. I think I'm good though. Any attempt to sue my ass would be amusing/terrifying.

Check to be sure of course.

Check your credit card policy to see what kind of insurance they offer for rental cars. Mine provides the same coverage as I could buy from the rental company, for example. But I don't know whether this is a NA thing... car rental in parts of Europe where I've thought about it are absolutely horrendous, so it's probably not as common to rent cars. Shitty stick mini cars for $150/day... yeah, no thanks. On top of that, I also have insurance through my employer -- but that wouldn't go for a vacation trip. You might want to check if your employer has a discount code with any of the car rental companies. Mine does and there's no limitation to only use it for business trips. At times I pay less than half the usual rate, but in some cases there's no discount at all.

I did a similar trip from LA to Vegas and I was advised that LA requires drivers to have insurance covering medical costs. It would be covered by your usual car insurance, but since I don't have a car, I went ahead and paid for that. I think it cost me an extra $5/day on top of the usual insurance. As I was thinking about it, they bumped me up to their premium car, which would have cost me an extra $50/day. I think that's pretty common, especially if they see you plan on taking a roadtrip.

As for sites to use: I find priceline.com pretty useful for finding cheap car rentals. I also check advantage.com, which offers very competitive rates and always provided me with a nice car.

Northerner_sl said:

Many (most?) CCs will cover your insurance needs. Hey, get more if you like but in most instances you are just throwing money away for fun.

I get having extra insurance when traveling in south america or africa or whatever but in NA you are pretty much good to go with your CC's coverage. At least that's what I've always been told and I rent a *lot*. It might be a corporate thing I suppose but I'm doing it on my own CC and although I've never hit and killed anyone stateside yet, it is only a matter of time. I think I'm good though. Any attempt to sue my ass would be amusing/terrifying.

Check to be sure of course.

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Actually it varies. Many of these companies, should you wreck their vehicle, will ding you not just for the $3000 bumper but the loss of business income that thing generates. Depending on where you're from and what kind of coverage you have that may or may not be covered. Laws are all over the place on how business income interruption is paid and this is only more complex when you start adding different countries in the mix.

In addition, many policies have limitations on where they will follow you. As an example, some companies even here in the USA require you to contact them and let them know you'll be in Canada or Mexico or there is no coverage. Some will extend it automatically. The complications only grow depending on what country you're from and how badly the carrier wants to get out of paying a claim.

While some credit cards offer you basic coverage they are not all the same. They also hardly cover everything you'll be facing when a claim does come up.

yeah, if you travel for work and you have a good travel manager who can deal with shit, then go ahead and let your CCs/insurance pick it up. Otherwise, always take the rental companies. You would be completely in the legal right if anything happened to the car, but it can require tons and tons and tons of bullshit time wasted to deal with it and have weird consequences on your insurance, driving record, etc.

A friend got in an accident with a rental, and his wife had to spend dozens of hours going in between insurance, credit card, and rental place disputing shit and arguing with everyone. The credit card company tries to make the insurance company pay, the insurance wants the credit card company, etc. Its just a mess. Meanwhile I've had two or three accidents in rentals (not my fault!), one time in Miami I just called em up and told them their car wasn't starting at the corner of somewhere and somewhere and I'm taking a taxi to the airport, and they said ok no problem we'll go pick it up. Another time in Canada another car ran a red light and crashed into me, they came out with a new car and took care of all the towing and shit. Didn't have to do jack either time, just fill out an accident report and send it in by mail.

It also helps to have preferred status and use a big company, you can get Avis preferred and hertz gold easy and those two are pretty good at treating customers decently.

I'd have to agree, the bbb is a total joke.

Kedwyn_sl said:

I'd have to agree, the bbb is a total joke.

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heh, I love it when people threaten to report me to the BBB. I just laugh at them.

Although I checked out of curiosity, and apparently we have an A+ rating. Odd, since we've never joined. They do seem to know how long we've been around, and even what kind of work we do, which is somewhat surprising. I'd be curious to know where they got the information from. We've kept our info up to date with Dunn and Bradstreet or D&B, so maybe they got it there.