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car hire excess insurance

Posted: Wed Feb 23, 2011 11:31 pm
by John54
As most selfdrivers already know from experience, insurances from car hire companies do not cover all possible damage to the hired car. The renter can be hold liable for any damage upto 4000 euro or so, depending on company and rental conditions. This even if an accident or damage is not your fault.

And if you wreck or damage the car with no third party involved, like driving at night and hitting an elephant, or turning over on a gravel road, you still have to pay for ALL the damage. And no, nor the basic insurance or the expensive excess insurance covers this. You have to cough up the full damage up to the day value of your rented car. So much for insurance.

To cover the excess risk, car hire companies offer an additional insurance, known as excess damage waiver. You can choose to cover 50% or 100% of this risk, with reduced or zero risk involved. Apart from that you might need an other additional insurance to cover damage to tyres and windscreen.

These additional insurances are very expensive. A full cover can cost you around 20 to 25 euro per day! I intend to hire two 4x4 Hilux for 20 days. The no-risk insurances would then cost us an extra 800 to 1000 euro! Bear in mind that this would only cover a maximum risk of around 2 x 4000 euro and tyres & windscreens, say 10.000 euro at best. You probably pay less to insure your house, healthcare or an all risk car insurance for a whole year.

The good news is that in recent years, independent insurance companies have developed insurances for these car hire excess covers. And they are a LOT cheaper. Have a look at this website: http://www.insurance4carrental.com/. Other companies not mentioned here, also offer these covers.

You can choose from daily coverage and annual coverage, where the annual one is cheaper if you rent for more than ten days or so. There is a downside though, since not all companies accept 4x4 pickup type cars such as the Hilux or Nissan. They are considered as being trucks. Thoroughly check out their policies and rates, and contact them to be sure your intended rental vehicle will be covered.

For my own car rental case as decribed above, zero excess insurance costs are around 150 euro for TWO insurance policies for a whole year, including glass & tires, personal accident, theft, key loss & other benefits.

Check it out and save a lot of money!
John

Re: car hire excess insurance

Posted: Fri Aug 03, 2012 8:08 am
by jeff1909
John54 wrote:As most selfdrivers already know from experience, insurances from car hire companies do not cover all possible damage to the hired car. The renter can be hold liable for any damage upto 4000 euro or so, depending on company and rental conditions. This even if an accident or damage is not your fault.

And if you wreck or damage the car with no third party involved, like driving at night and hitting an elephant, or turning over on a gravel road, you still have to pay for ALL the damage. And no, nor the basic insurance or the expensive excess insurance covers this. You have to cough up the full damage up to the day value of your rented car. So much for insurance.

To cover the excess risk, car hire companies offer an additional insurance, known as excess damage waiver. You can choose to cover 50% or 100% of this risk, with reduced or zero risk involved. Apart from that you might need an other additional insurance to cover damage to tyres and windscreen.

These additional insurances are very expensive. A full cover can cost you around 20 to 25 euro per day! I intend to hire two 4x4 Hilux for 20 days. The no-risk insurances would then cost us an extra 800 to 1000 euro! Bear in mind that this would only cover a maximum risk of around 2 x 4000 euro and tyres & windscreens, say 10.000 euro at best. You probably pay less to insure your house, healthcare or an all risk car insurance for a whole year.

The good news is that in recent years, independent insurance companies have developed insurances for these car hire excess covers. And they are a LOT cheaper. Have a look at this website: http://www.insurance4carrental.com/. Other companies not mentioned here, also offer these covers.

You can choose from daily coverage and annual coverage, where the annual one is cheaper if you rent for more than ten days or so. There is a downside though, since not all companies accept 4x4 pickup type cars such as the Hilux or Nissan. They are considered as being trucks. Thoroughly check out their policies and rates, and contact them to be sure your intended rental vehicle will be covered.

For my own car rental case as decribed above, zero excess insurance costs are around 150 euro for TWO insurance policies for a whole year, including glass & tires, personal accident, theft, key loss & other benefits.

Check it out and save a lot of money!
John
Hi John,

I am wondering if you have a phone number for the insurance company you mention. I'd like to give them a call about an upcoming insurance policy I need to take out. I also found some quotes at Cheap Auto Insurance Quotes but do you think these are as good?

Thanks in advance,

Jeff

Re: car hire excess insurance

Posted: Fri Aug 03, 2012 8:55 am
by selfdrive4x4
We offer clients of Selfdrive4x4.com a very attractive Excess insurance in combination with a 4x4 rental, Excess insured up to 3500 Euro (sufficient for most rentals) and off-road damage (normally) excluded by the local insurance (rental company) up to 7000 Euro. Off-road will even cover wading / river crossing, under body damage glass & tires etc. Rates per day just 8 Euro for camping 4x4 and 4,50 Euro for standard 4x4. On a 25 days rental it will normally save our clients 500+ Euro's on insurance costs. And due to the fact off-road damage is included this insurance cover is a much better one than the local options. Unfortunately we are only allowed to offer this service to Dutch and Belgium clients. More info: info@selfdrive4x4.com