I have rental car reservations, in mid March, with pickup at the Hertz office just outside Termini Station. Does anyone have any experience with this office? I know I've read semi-horror stories about some other rental car offices, and wanted to avoid any such experience personally.

There were other offices from which to pick up the car, but this one seemed to be the easiest to plan an exit from Rome (by getting to the A24 just south of Termini and connecting with the ring road and heading north on the A1 to Monticchiello, where we'll be staying for a week). Comments on the wiseness, or lack thereof, of this planned route would also be welcome. Thanks!

Where are you staying? We went to the Hertz in Villa Borghese b/c it was closest to our hotel. If you happen to be close to that office, we had a good experience. It was easy to find and leave from from the location.

Rented from that office in '08 and had no problems unless you want to count the car looked as if it had gone through some minor fender benders and was told they didn't have an automatic which we had reserved.

I had more of a problem finding my way out of town to get to the ring road.

I picked up a car here once. I am (at least was) a frequent visitor to Rome, but still found some moderate difficulty picking up the A24 out of the city. Once you're on it it's fine (basically a freeway type road that connects with the GRA ring road as you've already noted), but be prepared for some confusion between the rental car park at Termini and the start of the A24.

Here are pretty comprehensive directions from SlowTravel on leaving from both the Termini and Villa Borghese locations:

http://www.slowtrav.com/italy/drivin...tions_rome.htm

Be aware that when you pick up from a train station in Italy, there is an 8% surcharge on the whole rental which Hertz will detail as "location charge" or something like that. So if you pick up at Villa Borghese you'll save the 8% and be further North to begin.

Thanks for the responses. We're actually staying just off the Campo de Fiori, so it's a bit closer to the Termini location, but not by much. Considering the 8% extra, I might consider going to the Borghese location.

Those directions are great lovisa, thanks so much. Though the slowtrav directions don't explicitly say it (as they do for Termini), I suppose the actual Hertz office is located inside the garage at Borghese?

By the way, I changed my reservations, and saved 20 Euro! Thanks!