Choosing Car Hire Insurance

Sunday, September 5th, 2010 at 5:36 pm

When hiring a car, its usually a very good idea to take the car hire insurance very seriously indeed.

Why?

The cost of hiring the car

Its almost certainly the case that you took time and trouble over selecting your rental car deal to begin with.

You could have taken time to look and compare prices along with the terms and conditions.

As part of that, you perhaps made sure that the deal included insurance cover so as to protect your financial interests.

However you may wish to take care if offered standard insurance as you may still have to pay charges.

How?

Rental company insurance the small print

Typically, rental company insurance thats included in the deal will cover you against damage or injuries you cause to others (third party liability) and for damage incurred toby the rental vehicle (Collision Damage Waiver or CDW).

At least that will be the case in the UK and many EU countries. If youre renting in the USA or some other countries, the rental may include very little in-the-price insurance at all.

Even where it is included, typically the rental companies will include a number of key factors that are worth noting:

their policy may carry excess of up to Â£1600 Â– thatÂ’s the amount you may have to pay as a contribution to the costs of any claim;

your CDW car hire insurance policy may exclude a number of areas of the vehicle from its protection Â– typically the tyres, under-body and glass (plus perhaps other areas) and your credit card may be charged if theyÂ’re damaged;

it might also set a limit on the amount that may be paid out in the event of a third party claim

The result of these things means that even if you have rental company cover, you may still find yourself facing substantial charges to your credit card after an accident.

Topping up your hire car insurance

If you dont like the sound of that, you broadly speaking have two options for increasing your insurance cover

pay out for extra insurance for the rental car, often called top up insurance;

to take out a car hire insurance excess policy with an online provider of rental car insurance.

in this case the rental company may offer to drastically reduce or even remove the amount of excess you have to pay.

In the case of the latter, the specialist providers insurance policy will reimburse you for any additional related costs you need to pay the car hire company following an accident or issue.

You may also wish to look around online for your insurance policy as this might be the cheapest way of finding cover. Of course, to ensure that you find a suitable product, do read the small print. There is always certain terms that need checking when considering an insurance policySo, car hire insurance is a subject worth thinking about - if you`d like to avoid some expensive and unpleasant surprises!

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