travelfan1

I was just reading Jayne's post about renting a manual/will it come back to her. A response was given that the rate was much lower if you listed UK instead of the US as your country of origin. I am livid. Exact information entered/same car...US rate was $1,148, UK rate was 270 which translates to $478. Help me understand the difference. Has anyone from the US ever lisited the UK as your country of origin?

Sarvowinner

Yes

afterall

That seems strange. One wanders why? Can't be because they think Americans can't drive a manual car (though I believe many can't). That would be more reasonably covered by higher insurance costs.

That would make sense. But for up front charges, not fair.

kelliebellie

Shhhh!!! I was the one that gave that tip because it was a tip given to me on this board before our Spain trip. Saved me tons of $$$.

If you call AutoEurope they will tell you that you shouldn't book it that way and you probably won't receive your voucher. But if you receive your voucher, then it went through.

On all the other international AutoEurope sites, they give you a spot to put in your home address, complete with a spot to put in US and put in your state. So you aren't lying on the actual rental form. And I got sent a voucher no problem and had no problem using it. I had a non-credit card held other reservation made as well just for back-up.

The other interesting thing is that with each different country of origin, you will get a completely different set of cars! Listing UK as the starting point allowed me to rent the Mercedes A Class automatic. A choice I was not given on the US site. It turned out to be the absolute perfect car for us. Why wouldn't that be listed on all their sites?

So, I guess what I'm saying is yes it is weird and wrong, but shush and don't screw it up for the rest of us.

StCirq

Why are you outraged? Just take advantage of it. It might be the exchange rate, it might be xenophobia, it might be anything...who cares?

Dukey

Oh, please..you ARE LYING if you say you live somewhere else but even the Autoeurope people in Portland, Maine, cannot "adequately" explain it and yes, the voucher will go through so take advantage of this "loophole" if that's what it is.

They charge what they think the "market" will bear and that means that (the assume) US travelers will/can pay MORE.

FrankS

$1148?? How long was the rental? I rencently got a $320/w from Avis Europe with a dropoff in another country. I priced Autoeurope too, they were about 10% higher\

I cant imagine they are charging UK people much less

kelliebellie

I saved $800 on my automatic in Spain by switching that one little detail.

And I didn't lie about where I lived. When filling out the form I put my USA address for my home address.

travelfan1

It was a weekly rental for an automatic. And sorry...don't want to mess anything up for anyone! I'm not at the rental stage yet but I'll need at least a weekly rental and I'd prefer an automatic, which is why I used that criteria.

kelliebellie

I'm sure it is fine. I just didn't want you to go calling them and demanding they fix it!

Be happy! You've just saved $700 on your next vacation budget.

kelliebellie

Oh, and don't forget to try all the other English speaking countries (Ireland, Canada, etc.) and the foreign ones too if you can navigate the language.

travelfan1

And why shouldn't any US resident be upset at being charged for the exact same thing...that's over $600 and since my pockets aren't endless that would go a long way towards food, wine and extras!

travelfan1

Canadians can be upset too...their rate came up $1028.

bobthenavigator

I am very surprised at THAT much difference---usually about 20%. Are you sure you have the same parameters?

clairobscur

I was surprised by this thread so I checked. I entered the same informations, for the same car, picked up at Heathrow. I tried with the United States, The UK and France.

And I got almost the same amount for the three rentals...except not in the same currency.

It was US $ 187 for an American, £ 204 for a Brit and € 184 for a Frenchman.

So, there are wide and inexplicable differences in price,but in this case, the Brits are the ones paying the most, and the Americans much less than anybody else.

Is it conceivable that Autoeurope has national divisions that fix their prices independently, and "loan" the cars to each other? So, for instance the French division would have decided that they would be renting a manual Ford Mondeo for five days for € 184 while the American division would have decided to rent the same car for $ 187? And that in turn they "rent" the car from their British division for an unknown amount????

StCirq

Really, the parameters can't be the same. There are certainly small differences in prices, but either you don't understand the exchange rates or you're using different criteria for the different sites.

clairobscur

Thinking twice, what I just wrote probably make sense. If Autoeurope is renting a car to me, they're probably more interested in the price their French (I'm French) concurrence is a offering than in the price their American branch is offering to American customers. And they determine the price accordingly.

At least, that would be my guess. Though it doesn't really explain why in the OP's example, the American customer is paying vastly more and in my example, he's paying vastly less. Except maybe if the car picked by the OP is much more in demand in the USA, and the car I picked much more in demand in France and the UK.

clairobscur

"Really, the parameters can't be the same. There are certainly small differences in prices, but either you don't understand the exchange rates or you're using different criteria for the different sites."

Well, try yourself to see if you get a different result. I picked each time the same duration (September 15 to September 20), the same airport to pick up and give back the car, and the same model. As for the exchange rates, I had nothing to do since the price were quoted in $ for the USA, £ for the UK, € for France. I just reported the prices as quoted.

And you just have to click on a different flag to switch for one country to another. Of course, I might have made a mistake (giving different dates on different tries, for instance), but there aren't that much informations to fill, so I doubt it. Plus it's apparently consistent with other poster's experiences.

Kristina

I have a 3 day rental in France coming up with them. I live in the US, but used the British website, using my US address.
The British website was substantially cheaper and certain things like the cost to pick up at the train staion were included (saving more $$) where they were not on the US website.
Hopefully, we will have no problems when we go to pick up the car.

kelliebellie

I think the price difference mainly includes automatics. Americans will pay a premium for one since they are the norm here. Search only for automatics and see what comes up.