| erenazul13:42 UTC09 Jul 2007 | Hello. We are trying to find a better rental car dealer in Corsica. There are about 7 of them at the airport in Ajuccio.
Which one do you recommend?
also for diving, is it necessary to reserve a spot?
thank you
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| kerouac218:00 UTC09 Jul 2007 | Go to the Auto Europe site and set your home country as Spain (you will pay more if you set any other country). However, you will have to navigate the site in Spanish -- if that is a problem, set an English language country first to help you find your way around the site. This will allow you to compare the price difference as well. Your car will almost certainly be supplied by Europcar.
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| strawberita20:17 UTC09 Jul 2007 | mmmh, the infamous Auto Europe...
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| strawberita20:19 UTC09 Jul 2007 | The cheapest rental I've found was through Alamo. You can check their website or get quotes through wesites like voyagesSNCF.com
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| artemis220:37 UTC09 Jul 2007 | Hmmm, AutoEurope, I am not so happy anymore with their conditions of 'refundable excess' - will probably start a topic about it.
OP, you are from the USA? If you would use AutoEurope (and their rates usually ARE the best) better refuse CDW and cover it with your CC.
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| micolett21:43 UTC09 Jul 2007 | What do you mean by "reverve a spot", concerning diving? Are you bringing you own gear, or will you rent some?
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| artemis203:36 UTC10 Jul 2007 | Kerouac, the refundbale excess conditions with AE are between you and AE, not between you and the car supplier. This means that in case of small damage you may have to pay (a part of) the excess to the supplier, which you then 'theoretically' can reclaim from AutoEurpe, providing you have a police accident report (and then AE requests another accident report from the supplier). In practice the problem starts here: try to get a police accident report for some scratches that someone caused to you while you were parked, small damage - but easily costing some 100's of euros if noticed. Good luck!
It all turned out well for us, because the car finally wasn't checked on the outside when we returned it. But it caused us some days of worrying and much of lost time trying to obtain an 'accident report' from the Portuguese police and after them from the Guardia Nacional, which they simply refused to give for a bunch of scratches - it was impossible to get that report!
What i want to say is that there is a fundamental difference when you rent a car including CDW coverage without excess/deductible/own risk, or with a 'refundable excess' which AE sales.
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| kerouac217:57 UTC10 Jul 2007 | Every now and then, particularly in the winter, I choose one of the Auto Europe deals with the refundable excess, especially when it is only about 5 euros more. But I have never had a problem with a car when I paid for it, so I have no idea how it works to try to get the refund from AutoEurope.
I would assume that it is a bureaucratic nightmare, but I am very good at bureaucracy, and I usually beat bureaucrats at their own game with documentary overkill, and I really enjoy it. I even triumphed over the French "service central d'état civil" in Nantes after a 13 year battle by tripping them up in their own rules. But to go back to AutoEurope, the only time I claimed something from them (I was downgraded from the size car I had requested and paid for), it was well and simply handed by the office in Germany that deals with French customers. I was just told to fax them a photocopy of the rental agreement, and they refunded double the difference, albeit after about three months.
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| artemis219:27 UTC10 Jul 2007 | Their conditions are clear:
Excess refund cover from Auto Europe: Should the local supplier charge you for the excess amount on the vehicle you may reclaim this charge providing that you complete a police accident form & an accident report form with the supplier when returning the car copies of which should then be sent to Auto Europe
They also have confirmed me in the past by mail that they need a 'police accident form' to refund the excess, in any situation: when the damage is caused by the renter, when the damage is caused by an unknown party, always. We all know that damage isn't always caused in an accident. Until this rental (and i have rented 40+ cars in the past and never had a problem) i said to myself: 'ok, if something happens i just go to the police and ask for a declaration - piece of cake', something which is easy to obtain in my homecountry, but not elsewhere..
Another disadvantage of this system is that when picking-up the car one has to triple check existing damage, which is of less (or no) importance when being covered without excess.
Another option: Renting from AE without refundable excess and take an extra excess coverage from the supplier, on the spot. But then one never knows how much your rental will cost, before booking. Suppliers vary (we have had Europcar, Avis and now Guerin, partner of National and Alamo - during 3 rentals). Conditions of the same supplier vary, depending on the location. With AE one only knows the supplier after booking, when you get the voucher. Aditional excess coverage costs offered by rental car suppliers can vary enormously, ranging from a few euros per day up to more than 100 euros per week.
I like to know exactly what i am going to pay, so this is no good option for me.
What i have learnt out of this experience is that their system - in practice - isn't at all as comfortable as it looks like in theory.
I have sent them a mail about our last experience the 28th of june but they didn't answer..
Kerouac, do you mean that you usually rent without excess coverage? This time the supplier had a CDW and TP excess of 955€.
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