Where2Travel

I am looking at the Dollar car rental site at car hire for possible dates next April. I am trying different pick-up locations with LAS as the drop-off location. All other parameters are unchanged.

I thought LAS would be the cheapest pick-up location because there would be no one-way drop-off fee. However, LAX is much cheaper (still with a LAS drop-off) because there are fewer elements listed in additional charges an no drop-off fee either:

LAS pick-up and drop-off
FACILITY CHARGE - $48.00
VEHICLE LICENSE FEE - $14.38
APT ACCESS REC FEE - $31.15
STATE TAX - $30.27
Rental Tax - $31.25

LAX pick-up, LAS drop-off
STATE TAX - $24.80

Can anyone explain the reason for this and whether there are any "rules" to help determine what options work out cheaper? Eg will a California pick-up generally mean fewer charges? PHX seems to be a lot more expensive (with even more and much higher charger) but I had already heard that it was expensive to rent cars from here.

Please excuse any ignorance on my part. I am travelling from the UK, have rented cars in the US on a number of times but have never noticed such varying fees before now. Previously my travel plans had been more fixed with little or no option over the car pick-up/drop-off locations

Betsy

Can't speak specifically to your question, but factor the rates at www.hotwire.com into your plans. We've used the site for several rentals without any problems.

tracys2cents

recently rented at LAX (from Avis) and there was a 10% fee added at the end that was not mentioned on the reservation quote.

Perhaps Nevada has a law stating that all charges must be stated up front and California doesn't?

At any rate, LAX is one of the few airports that still has what I consider to be fair and reasonable add-on taxes and fees. Some cities are abominably high...Manchester NY, Providence, Phoenix....can go as high as 40% to even 60% add ons!

Where2Travel

Thanks for the replies. With airfare and car hire being a big chunk of the overall cost, I am looking at making sure these costs stay reasonable. It sounds like LAX may be a good option because of better car-hire costs and there are quite a few airlines that offer non-stop flights from London and the fares are pretty competetive.

I don't want to fly home from LAX so we avoid backtracking but that shouldn't cause too much problem unless I get stuck with a big one-way drop-off fee.

microdol

for LAX, picking up a car will be about a 1 hour wait - maybe more - in the pickup line. We got bussed there from the terminal in July and it took an hour and 20 minutes to get the car.
I was told Budget - Dollar - Enterprise - are all the same - long waits in line.

Dropping off took precisely 5 minutes (different line).

Not sure about LAS, I only know about LAX.

Plan accordingly.