I'm working on a car rental for our annual trip to Hawaii in April. I normally use Avis, but their prices in Hawaii have gone up nearly 40% since last April. I stumbled on a great deal with Hotwire. I haver never used them. Has anybody had any experience using Hotwire? Are they reliable? Do they use decent rental agencies? Will my car be there when I arrive? Any advice will be appreciated.

I have used them before and just yesterday I booked my car for Austin through Hotwire. They tell you the companies they will be using. Mine were Avis, Hertz, Enterprise and a couple of others. It works just like any other rental website. Give them your arrive time and flight info, if necessary, and has worked beautifully in the past.

I've always found a better deal with Hotwire than say Expedia, etc. If you don't mind not knowing which agency when booking I highly recommend them.

Check Dollar directly....they often are cheaper than Hotwire when you factor in all of the fees and other charges.

Isn't hotwire a prepay, before knowing details and no refund policy?

Personally, I prefer to have the ability to cancel/change if I need to do so.

Southwest was having a great deal last week on car rentals. Did not have to be flying with them either, it was a stand alone deal.

Deb

Last week I found a car with Alamo for $119 a week. With the 10% discount that they give you for having membership in practically anything(ie frequent flier, costco etc) and the $20 off per week coupon right on the Alamo website, the price came down to $90 a week.

Why bother with pre-paid, nonrefundable deals like Hotwire and Priceline when there are awesome deals out there that you don't have to pay-even-if-you-don't-use?

I don't know Hotwire's car rental cancellation/prepay policies, however, just letting you know that we used Hotwire for cars in Maui and Kauai last summer and it was fine - Avis in both cases.

Hotwire currently only uses Avis, Budget, Hertz, National and Enterprise.

You can go search for and reserve your best deal elsewhere, and then just before you commence your trip, go to Hotwire to see if they beat it (and Priceline too).

If 24 hours before your trip and you still have problem with a prepaid rental, then maybe you have bigger issues than trying to get the best rate. In that case, don't do prepaid anything.

ray, always the voice of reason

Deb

Have used Hotwire for car rental several times and never had any problem. As Deb mentioned it is prepay but I don't have a problem with this. Just make sure your plans will not change.

I have found them to have the best prices and have used them for LAX, Portland, and just booked Kona in April (Hertz). You get the total price, including fees before you finalize your booking.

We have used them for rental on Kaua`i with no problems

I agree with milemarker0, I've gotten better deals from Dollar than from Hotwire and without prepaying or having a no cancellation policy. That's been especially true when booking a couple months in advance. But I can't speak for Hawaii.