One Way Car rental from Europcar for 1 Dollar
Pickup From: Broome Airport
Drop Off: PERTH AIRPORT
Deal Date: From 04 Jan to 25 Jan
Availability: 21 Left
Included: includes 2800 kilometers + basic protection
Rental Price: 1 Dollar
Rental Period: 168 Hours (7 Days)
Below Link:
https://www.europcar.com.au/offer/one-way-au.step
One Way rentals available in NZ also.
Route1: Wellington Airport to Auckland Airport
Route2: Christchurch Airport to Picton CITY
Route3: Queenstown Airport to Christchurch Airport
Europcar employee here. Here's my 2 cents of advice:
If you take Europcar's premium cover, you'll have 0 excess so it's all good. It's not cheap tho. But you don't have to worry about what damage is on the car before or after you have it.
If you take a third party insurance (cheaper) and something does happen, be ready to be stung by Europcar for a lot (usually 5,500 AUD max) and be out of pocket for a while because filing a claim to those insurance companies and getting the refund takes quite a while. And if you decide to do this, take a detailed video of the whole car before you leave the car-park (you might need it).
Make sure you do either one or the other tho. I'd say 1 in 10 cars nowadays come with new damage (windscreen chips most of the time) and get charged.
Also, when you drop the car off, you have the choice to walk away to catch your flight and let them do the inspection of the car later and send you the invoice to your email. Don't do that. Get someone to take a look at the car while you're there (even if you have to wait for a bit) and print you an invoice or at least complete the check-in of the car in the system.
I still don't get how the major car rental companies in AU and NZ get away with such massive excess on insurance VS Europe (costs in each country in Europe vary, Spain tends to be the cheapest) which is roughly between 600-1200 Euros max.
As an employee that has slightly more access than most, I am often shocked at how expensive it is to repair a vehicle. Having to repair with genuine parts as we hand the vehicles back at any time between 3 and 18 months the amount racks up quickly if we replace with non genuine. It's not hard to have a 3k bill from one corner run in too.
He’s talking about the insurance excess, not the actual cost of repairs. Should cost less to repair a hire car than a privately owned car due to the volume a hire company would do. Most hire car companies also self insure, so that cuts the middle mans profit out off the insurance cost too.
From my experience hire companies (Avis, Hertz & Europcar etc) never bother getting minor accident damaged fixed, as I hardly ever hire a car that doesn’t have small dints, scuffs and scratches and I’m sure they charged the customers who did it.
The amount they charge for excess reduction is a profit stream for car hire companies, plain and simple.
@JmanNick: I don't know if most hire car companies self insure or not. I highly doubt it (You'd have to be crazy to give insurance to a type of company that you know will claim 1 in 10 cars as damaged). But I tell you for sure that Europcar doesn't. They fix the damage themselves. And by that I mean they pay directly to the mechanic, detailer, or whatever company that does the fixing on the dent, scratch, windscreen replacement, or whatever the case.
@PabloVicioso:
I don't think you understand what "self insure" means…
@Melbourne Matt: Oh… Sorry, I probably don't. What does it mean in this scenario?
@PabloVicioso: Its exactly what you described as being done. Rather than going to an insurance company, they cover the cost and risks themselves internally. Rather than being insured by another company you are 'self' insured.
@futureminime: Oh, yeah. That makes sense, thanks for the explanation
The major companies in ANZ are now ostensibly insurance companies. Their entire revenue model is based on selling insurance policies. Their staff are trained to push and scare customers into buying said policies.
Policy prices don't reflect risk, but rather what they can get away with. When you're paying an excess reduction policy of $29 dollars extra per day (ie an effective annual policy of $10,500) for a $20,000 small car you've got to scratch your head.
Let's hope the ACCC acts.
Looks like that's ~$41 per day based on renting a Yaris. Which is a great deal if you're only paying $1 for the rental.
But for a moment indulge me on the following, sightly off topic metrics…
Lets say you were paying the usual rental rates for a couple of days somewhere in Oz. $41/DAY excess reduction on a Yaris is an effective annual policy of $14,965 for a vehicle that costs around $16k drive away!
Under 25yo? You're effective annual policy on the Yaris is an extra $37 (on top of the $41) per day. (effective annual policy of $28,000 on the Yaris!
Your cost is only the length of time that YOU hire for, not the entire year.
There might be 300 other people driving each car each year. Each risk is separate.
Remember that it's more expensive to repair a car than to build one.
I doubt that ANY rental vehicle would last a year without damage.
Hence the use of "effective" anual policy.
No one pays more for a repair than the market value of the car!
@ash2000: While any individual repair won't be more than the market value of the car, if every 13 weeks you have someone break the bumper then you need to repair the same part 4 times a year. If every repair is 25% of the value of the car ($4k I think is conservative for the bumper) then you are hitting the car value in repairs over a year ($16k).
This is probably a bit high for the (frequency * cost), with many of the incidents probably being small but PabloVicioso did mention that from their experience 1 in 10 cars comes back with damage.
I still agree they are making a killing on the excess. To be honest I'd have thought with those numbers you'd probably be able to cost effectively run a private smash repair shop internally (at least 1 per state for the capital cities, and regional stores could still outsource).
I have always used Trip cover or 1Cover. Tripcover cost $10/day and cover for upto $4000 excess for 7 days. Options for $6000 and $8000 excess cover is also available.
1Cover is often cheaper than Tripcover. Cost $48 for a 7 days for a $5000 excess cover with
$100 out of pocket excess charged in case of a claim.
Some black/platinum credit cards also provide rental car excess cover.
Never buy insurance from rental company. They are a huge ripoff.
RACV have a similar policy with $1000 excess, for $42 a month (then $10 more for each additional month). A similar policy from a car rental company would cost you at least $900/month.