I ride a lot of buses and trains in my travels. Much of the world has great train service and really comprehensive bus coverage. I got everywhere I wanted to go in Slovakia, for example, without any prior research. I just showed up at the station or depot and found the next transport in the direction I wanted to go. However, sometimes I really need or want a car. This is usually if I have a speed trip outlined, or when I want to visit a lot of small towns (a recent lap through Southern Germany to hill and forest locations). For a couple of years I averaged four days per month in rentals. But at the tail end of COVID I used rentals for 150 days out of the year in eighteen countries.
I admit to being confounded about the variability of daily car rental prices in different countries. I rather understand why it will be $110 a day in New York City, but I have no idea why a car costs $32 in Uruguay, and $72 in Rwanda. A quick web search to establish baseline prices helps me decide if I really ‘need’ a car, and whether or not I should alter the arc of a trip to make an early drop off in a final city, followed by bus or rideshare.
I have tried using the loyalty programs (Avis and National) to see if they saved me money (sadly, no), booking time (no) or pick up time (almost never). I have had occasional success with the Europcar program, autopopulating the information fields and granting the occasional free weekend rental. But even with a completed online profile and prepaid contract I had to start from scratch in the office in Minsk, Belarus and Turin.
I next tried following the teaser screens that pop up after booking a flight (‘need a car in Mariehamm? Click here to save’). I did not find any price or service advantage. For years I did what I am sure pretty much everyone does – look on Expedia or Priceline or Skyscanner. I am brand agnostic but usually pick a name that I recognize – Thrifty, Sixt, Europcar. And I felt that I was getting a pretty good deal.
And then recently I discovered Qeeq.com. It appears to be a meta aggregator site. My first five rentals have been startlingly (not a word I use lightly) less expensive than Expedia and Skyscanner. I initially thought that they were capturing off brand rental companies for those discounts, but the bookings have been mostly with brands I know and have used in the past.
One feature that I really like is that once the reservation is made, Qeeq regularly scans for lower prices and if they find one they automatically rebook. This worked on a Melbourne rental, and put $40 back in my pocket for zero effort on my part. Their website is a bit janky (be sure to login before you search, for example), and it markets hard to you, but it has really saved me crazy money.
When I am fairly certain of my specific dates I prepay if that option involves a significant price advantage. If there is not a price incentive do not prepay. A few times I have arrived at the airport car rental hall, to discover a long line at my chosen vendor. I simply searched Expedia for a good price from the vendors who did not have lines of customers, booked it, and abandoned my no-penalty existing reservation. You’re welcome.
Before leaving the US be sure to pick up an International Driving Permit ($60 for three years) from a AAA branch (super old school capable) or online IDP sites. This physical and digital document compliments your US license, confirming to authorities in other countries that you are licensed to drive certain categories of vehicles. It is most likely to be needed in countries where the local alphabet is not Latin. In many years of travel I have only been asked for this twice when renting a car, but I was glad that I had it. A very few outlier countries like Samoa require that you get a provisional local driver license. In reality this is simply a renamed tax, since the rental company just fills in a form with your information and collects a fee.
Since I do not own a car I do not have car insurance that covers rental cars. But there are two inexpensive ways to cover rentals – Auto insurance.
An inner circle of hell is reserved for the companies that list their rental prices, but then have an expensive surprise in store when you pick up the car. Not just taxes and fees of various kinds. In Costa Rica a week rental doubled in price as supplementary liability insurance is mandated. Every vendor in the country knows this, and yet the line item is not listed in the estimated total price. Be forewarned, and try not to be angry when you are are presented with the ‘take it or leave it’ option at the airport.
When renting a car, especially in the most developed countries, count on paying roughly 10% of your rental fee in additional payments, fines and fees. As you meander across swathes of completely novel landscape you will inevitably discover many surprises. Congestion fees; tollbooth free bridge crossing charges; restricted access lane fines; a startling number of speed and traffic light cameras. Special city emission zones; parking areas where it is impossible to access the payment app if you have a foreign telephone number. All will take a vig. Be prepared, when you visit your mailbox six months later, to find a few reminders from past trips. My record so far is two violations within 45 minutes in Bologna, which by the time they caught up to me, had compounded in expense to roughly $400.
I absolutely love Zipcar car sharing. It has a beautiful, simple app that lets me find, reserve and use their thousands of cars (and some vans) for periods as short as an hour. If you are carless in the US and Canada it is an absolute must have. They are, very slowly, expanding service into some other countries (Turkey, England, and others). I have tried similar services like Car2Go while traveling and have not had any luck in finding service that is broadly available and easy for me to access.
Additionally there is an emerging segment of peer-to-peer car renting with Turo.com , Getaround.com and others. They operate in many major cities in North America and a few European locations so cannot be a good resource for most world travels. As with anything peer-to-peer there are some impressive online disaster stories.
If you are considering motoring around Europe for an extended period (one to three months) definitely explore Buy-back leases. Shiny new cars that include insurance. This is a tax exploit that French car companies have built a business on. On a six week road trip I saved thousands (yes, thousands) of dollars over a conventional rental. There are plenty of pickup and drop off locations outside France (my pickup was in Barcelona, drop off in Paris). There are relatively modest additional fees for ’outside France’ service, but the cost savings are startling. If you would prefer to save those dropoff fees and have some extra time I recommend flying to France and spending a few glorious days driving to where you are planning to travel.
Learn to drive a manual transmission car sooner than later, because sooner or later you will have to drive a manual transmission (aka a ‘real’ car).
For rental bonus points visit Ireland and experience driving on the left side of the road. Then visit St. John, USVI, where the driver sits on the left and also drives in the left lane. Finally, for all points bonus visit Somaliland, where the driver sits on the right and drives in the right lane. P.s. these last two places are pretty spooky for pedestrians, because the drivers naturally hug the outside of the lane, instead of the middle of the road.