I posted a message a little while ago, but have since read up on Mapache, which sounds like it offers good deals. From reading other posts, I know to stay away from Advantage. Also, to repeat my earlier message, has anyone heard of or used http://www.renta4x4incostarica.com/ to rent a car? The deal sounds pretty good - includes all taxes, insurance, and unlimited miles for a 4x4 for only $35/day. From everything I've read on various CR message boards about car rentals, it sounds too good to be true! Any thoughts or advice would be greatly appreciated.

We've always found the best deals with Tricolor and typically pay about $40 day all-inclusive for a regular sedan, a little more for a small 4X4, about $50. Quoted price is always exactly what you pay. I don't know about the company you've mentioned.

In all my years packaging Costa Rica, the single greatest challenge has always been rental cars. Companies come and go. Less reputable companies run damage scams. Some overbook. Others do not have replacement vehicles if there is a problem, or offer proper support.

You get what you pay for. The insurance for a 4WD starts at $20.00 a day, and that is if you have credit card liability coverage. So even assuming this, you are only paying $15.00 per day for these vehicles. Even less, if they do not allow the credit card coverage. You get what you pay for.

I am not familiar with this particular company, but my questions would have to be as follows.

How new are these vehicles? The roads can be tough on rental cars to begin with, and customers tend to drive them harder than they would a vehicle they actually own. Rental cars have a short shelf life.

How many offices? If you break down in the boonies, is there support close by? What if you break down at night, will someone answer the phone?

Are you going to have a problem with false damage claims? Other than the company's own testimonials, what kind of references do they have? It is difficult to challenge a foreign credit card charge. What recourse do you have if there is a problem?

A fairly new Daihatsu Terios, from a well known reputable company, with credit card liability coverage works out to about $380.00 per week. This $35.00 dollar per day rental will cost you $245.00 per week. So you save $135.00, and have to pay the big deductible if you have an incident that your credit card would have covered.

A good rental car is essential for a positive travel experience. Look at it this way; If a couple spends $1200.00 on airfare. Say you spend another $2500.00 on hotels and tours. This means you are paying well over $500.00 a day to be there. When you factor in what you pay for hotels and airfare, $135.00 in a week is not much.

It is something to think about when your rental car is broken down in Northern Guanacaste. A large national company will get you a replacement from Liberia in an hour or two. I have seen one of the companies that I deal with bring a replacement car on a flatbed truck up the mountain to Monteverde, AFTER DARK. That's worth $135.00. Anyone who has driven that road in the daylight will agree!

Hope this helps! Let me know if I can offer more advice.

Warm Regards,
Pat Hewitt
(Travel professional)

Thanks, shillmac and Pat. Those are very helpful suggestions.

I have not used this company to rent in the past, but I have made some inquiries for my clients. From what I know their cars are much older than what most companies offer, the size is pretty small (meaning a subcompact or compact suv) and they only have offices in San Jose and do not deliver or offer any type of assistance outside of San Jose. I ususally use Adobe, TriColor or Mapache and have had good luck with the condition of the cars, customer service and them charging the rate quoted.

Thanks, PG. We have decided to go with Tricolor. Fingers crossed!

We are traveling to CR in Mar & also have made arrangements for a 4 x4 rental through Hertz just because we want the assurance of a larger company.
Does anyone have any experience renting a 4 x 4 through Hertz in CR.
Any info will be appreciated.

Hertz is excelent...I just returned a PRADO...TOYOTA that I drove for some of my costumers all over Osa...I visit my farm in DRAKES bay...and everything was just fantastic...they are a great company...I will stay away from small companies.

Luis
(professional Travel Agent)

I just rented a car from Budget Rental through Vacation City travel for about $50.00 per day with $14.00 per day insurance due at pick up. They also require a $750.00 deposit hold on a credit car at pick up. The rental will be delived to the Falmingo Beach Resort and pick it up. The car is the Daihatsu small SUV. I would not mind paying that price on a 2 day rental, but wonder if anyone has had experience with this rental company and travel service?

I worked with vacationcity and found them to be very reliable, with one caveat.

If you cancel a reservation, they'll charge you a $30 "administrative fee". , so make sure you want whatever you book before booking.

They'll waive the fee if you change the reservation.

We initially rented a car but decided to use a driver, so we cancelled the rental car and had them book a driver for one leg of our journey. They would've booked flights for us instead too, but there were none available.

We just returned from Costa Rica. Had a fantastic time, but had a bit of a hiccup when we arrived at Tricolor. They did not have the SUV we had reserved, but instead had a much smaller, 2-door one, which they tried to make us accept. The thing I didn't appreciate was that they brought us to Tricolor from the airport knowing that our car wasn't there (the driver who picked us up was also the office manager). If they had told us at the airport, we would have stayed there and tried to make other arrangements with one of the companies located at the airport. Luckily, there's an Alamo office right next door to the Tricolor office and we got a Daihatsu SUV from there instead. With taxes, extra driver charges, and liability insurance (they waived the CDW because my credit card covers that), the total came to $340 for 6 days. It was a bit more than the Tricolor quote, but we got the car we wanted, with the added assurance that Alamo had offices all over Costa Rica in case something happened with the car.

CRBound,
As someone who has rented from TriColor many times and who recommends them to people on this board without reservation, I am especially interested in your post. I realize that glitches sometimes happen, but Tricolor has never tried to give us something other than what we contracted for.
I wouldn't like that either!

Out of curiosity, was this the Liberia office or the one at SJO?

Shillmac,

This was at SJO airport. They said that the car we had reserved had not been returned on time by the previous renter, so that's why it wasn't available for us. I was surprised that they only had one SUV available (we were told that an upgrade to the next type of SUV was also not possible because they didn't have those in stock either). It was probably an aberration - these things happen - but I found it odd that an operation like Tricolor only had one SUV available.

Again, we felt like we were being forced to accept the smaller car since they had taken us from the airport where other rental companies are located. Tricolor was also late picking us up, so we had already wasted about an hour. The manager did offer to knock a little bit off the price we were quoted ($20), but at that point I was sufficiently disappointed with the service and just wanted the car we had reserved and went to Alamo next door. I know other people have had very positive experiences with Tricolor, but unfortunately I can't report the same.

In any event, we got the car and were off to enjoy a wonderful week in CR - our first stop was Villablanca in Los Angeles Cloud Forest about an hour from SJO. It was beautiful and tranquil and the perfect place to spend the night before venturing to Arenal the next day. Will post more on that and other recs in a separate post!

we just returned from cr as well and used tricolor. we had the opposite happen....they were out of the car we booked so we got a free upgrade. it was our first time using tricolor and they were very easy to deal with and we felt quite secure on their premises (the armed guard is a nice touch

We've been upgraded free of charge as well. It does sound like an aberration, but I agree it would have been appropriate to let you know they were in a bind immediately.

I'm guessing it was a matter of supply/demand and high season.

I am doing some future planning for taking my family (Nine adults) to CR Jan/09. I have been reading tremendous amount of info on car rentals (I'll need at least 2 more likely 3) We are go to Los Suenos Marriott for a week and the Arenal area for 2 days. Please help with suggestions on rental cars and also cell phones if possible.

You should be okay with a couple of Suzuki XL-7's. The two together should cost you about $800 for a week I'll continue to recommend Tricolor as the positive reviews have far outnumbered the negs. Our experiences (many rentals over the years) have all been positive. We have had special circumstances 4 or 5 times which Tricolor has always handled to our satisfaction.