Rental car help
 

Would like some advice regarding rental car companies/internet sites for period 20th July (LAS) thru to 9th Sept (LAX drop off) or if more economical back to LAS (2nd Sept). Does anyone have any hints? Can we use priceline/hotwire? any traps? Thanks in advance.

i would check orbitz to see what companies are at your airport, (also check the airport and their transportation page) then go to the individual companies (check to make sure you can pick up your car when you get in, not all are 24 hours operational for pick up)

when you see what the prices are, then check out hotwire etc. the main thing is with many of the car rental sites, you do NOT have to pay in advance, and you can change things about your reservation. (i had to change the dates by one day and alamo had no problem with the change and kept a great rate for a small suv)

if you use hotwire you can get an excellent rate but you cannot change any thing because you have to prepay your reservation.

i used hotwire once - it was work travel so i knew plans wouldn't change and got a midsize car in CA for 99/week (2006). that was a great price. so ......

That's a long time to rent a car from a regular car rental place. I don't think you can do one way rentals [pick up one place and drop in another] with priceline [not sure about hotwire or other less expensive prepay places] and I would hesistate prepaying for that long a period of time. IF you should have to change your plans, you will be out a lot of money.

Another thing to think about is car insurance. Do you have your own car with insurance on it? Check to see if it will cover rentals for that long a period of time [they may not].

Also, the insurance you get through credit cards [which will be secondary if you have personal car insurance] has lots of conditions that must be met for them to pay out on any claim. Mastercard will not insure for rentals over 15 consecutive days and Amex's limit is 30 on certain cards.

Paying CDW for that length of time is going to add up, but it may be cheaper in the long run.

There are several threads on here about car rentals and CDW.

http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=34909718

http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=34992655

Are 2 good ones to read.

Hope this helps...
Debi

you posted this question twice - you will probably have to split up your rental period and turn on one car, pick up another (unless you decide to lease)

You might try off site, lesser known names to cover this long a period. Something like Rent a Wreck might do longer periods, but probably not one way rentals.

I needed to rent a car last summer for 2 months in LAS and I can't think of anyplace I found that would rent longer than 30 days. I had to split my rental up but it wasn't too much of an inconvenience to exchange cars. I wound up going through Thrifty and it cost me roughly $1200 for that time period. I had reserved an economy for both of my bookings but I had never seen anything close to an economy anytime I was at their lot, I wound up having a Stratus for the entire time. Whatever you do make sure you sign up for the company's reward program as you will surely earn several free days renting for that long.

Budget & Hertz have monthly rates, though maybe not from their airport offices. Are you a U.S. Citizen?

yes, they have monthly rates - but not for more than a month like the OP needs.

The OP would need a monthly rate in Las Vegas, and then would need to rent a car separately for the one-way to Los Angeles. It wouldn't make sense to pay "one way rates" for a month and a half when you really only need to spend one day going "one way".
And if relying on credit-card insurance coverage. OP needs a no-fee Amex blue card which covers 30 day rentals.

Cannot thank you all enough for all this info. Looks like i need to do some home work. Not US citizen and probably it may be better to put a few flights into different areas then rent cars from there. Cheers

barni, because you are not a US citizen and do not have US car insurance you need to research the car insurance issues if you decide to rent a car in the US.

You'll have to pay for the insurance (if your credit card doesn't) -- but foreign visitors rent cars all the time

Renting a car isn't the problem - US resident or not. It is the length of time. Even US residents would have problems renting for more than 30 days.

But depending on your itinerary - flying between places and renting just for the local areas - or - renting a car and turning it in to rent another one could both be options.

Where are you planning to visit?

As other posters have noted, it is WAY more expensive to rent one-way so if you can avoid that, you should. I tried doing a one-way through Priceline but couldn't find a way to enter a different pick-up/drop-off location. I wrote to them and got a response that they only offer one-way in "select" destinations - though there seems to be no list of what those destinations are (I asked). A tip: be on the look-out for car rental discount coupons/codes. I get these offers regularly from my credit card company and got 25% off the total cost.

Perhaps if you post your itinerary and needs we can help. Jetblue.com is a discount airline that flies from LAS to Long Beach, near LA, that might work for you.

Betterbidding.com (the website that helps with hotwire and priceline) has a car rental checker page that gets prices (so you know what a "regular" rental would cost). They estimate a price of $1577 for the total time. Not sure whether that includes taxes or insurance.

May I suggest you take a look at the fatwallet travel deals forum and the flyertalk forums. I found a lot of discount codes and tips from the posters there with regards to car rental.

You can also join the rental companies' programs to bypass long queues at the counters and enjoy discounts and other benefits.

For example, National's Emerald Club allows you access to any car available in their Emerald Aisle as long as you book a mid size. So there's a chance you can get an SUV, convertible or upgrade for the price of the mid size.

The cheaper companies tend to be Fox, Dollar and Alamo but YMMV. I believe Hertz, Avis, National and Alamo do not have drop off charges (at least not when I was checking for pick up at LAX and drop off at SFO).

Sometimes it may be cheaper to rent at a nearby non airport location to avoid paying more taxes, especially if a cab costs less to go to that location.

Finally, am not sure if this has been posted before, but this makes interesting
reading.

9 Confessions From A Former Enterprise Rental Salesman

http://consumerist.com/consumer/ente...man-243325.php