I rarely rent cars in the UK; the last time was this summer when SWMBO rented a Ka from Enterprise in London for a few days and who were very competitive. As many of you will have realised, I have a holiday flat in Israel and travel there several times each year, usually renting a car on at least six occasions each year from as little as three days to as much as three weeks.
For a variety of reasons I always took a taxi from the airport and rented a car from a small local company who had very good prices and were very helpful, but their range of cars was limited and with three growing and argumentative children I wanted cars that they did not have (e.g. small seven seater like a Kia Carens). Also, the cost of the taxi was more than a day?s car rental, so it made sense to rent a more suitable car from the airport when we arrive.
So there are six companies with offices at the airport; five international companies and one large local company. Generally their prices are within 10% of each other so for several trips I have simply gone online a couple of weeks beforehand and spent ten minutes finding the best price and booking it. Earlier this year Avis were particularly good value, but are now back in line with the rest.
I thought I would have a go at some of the rental brokers like holidayautos.co.uk and was very surprised to find that they were a lot cheaper, sometimes by up to 40%. I have used them three times so far (the car is actually rented from Sixt), but was advised for my next trip at Christmas to visit carrentals.co.uk. This can be a confusing site at first, but eventually I worked out how it works (it searches brokers as well as the main rental companies) and found a deal through Easycar and have a deal with Budget again at some substantial discount to the main websites. Now I thought that Easycar were a broker also so I tried the Easycar website without clicking through from carrentals.co.uk. The price difference was surprising, with the click through page being about 10% cheaper than the direct page.
So what is going on? How do car rental companies operate so that the more people you broker through, the cheaper it becomes?
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Hi Espada - Feel a bit of a fraud because I don't know the answer to your question. I can however, recommend a book for your next long flight. I picked it up on a recent trip and it explains all those mysterious marketing tricks in an entertaining way. It's called "The Economic Naturalist" by Robert H Frank. Now if had been concentrating I could have given you a smug and apparently clever answer but clearly I must have nodded off at that chapter. Anyway, I think he calls these "purchase hurdles" as a sales technique and I'm sure they're very......something. Good book.
Jealous of your flat by the way. I go to the north of Israel sometimes on business and have come to know it a little.
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Well HB, I'll look out for the book and see if I can't my cars even cheaper. I have quite a few friends with flats near me, and it becomes a great big competition to see how little you can get your flights for and what's the best deal on car rentals.
You must tell me next time you are going to Israel. It will be good to have a Back Room meeting somewhere different. Where do you get to?
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Kfar Blum. ( shoe connection )
Although I think I already live quite near you and certainly come to Manchester regularly, might be easier to find a north Manchester cafe and get them to turn the heat up a bit. It wouldn't feel too different......
;-)
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Kfar Blum - Been there a few times for kayaking down the River Jordan with the kids and SWMBO goes to Naot Mordechai for the Naot shoes. Lovely part of the world.
Let me know when you are near North Manchester - we'll have a chat. My profile hopefully has my contact details.
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How do car rental companies operate so that the more people you broker through, the cheaper it becomes?
It is not just car rental, www.quidco.com/travel/car-rental/ but many other items you can get a further good discount on by going through "brokers" such as quidco and the myraid of price comparision websites. On some deals through quidco, you can sometimes end up getting paid more cashback than you have paid to buy the service or goods. [last year, my full RAC membership worth about £150 cost me just £25! ].
It is just another form of the silly money syndrome.
Edited by jbif on 13/11/2008 at 20:20
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HolidayAutos also offer their own full collision damage waiver which really does pay-up. So another advantage of using a broker. You do pay the original excess (which via HolidayAutos can be less too) but you get it back. I wrote a car off and did not lose out.
Some employers (mine for example) have a portal that offer discounts if you book by going through them first as a click-through. So HolidayAutos for me in 2006 was even cheaper.
As for answering the question how can it be cheaper this way - no idea and on the face of it it does not make sense does it. In the UK for work if I needed a car (which my company self insures) the cost of a decent size car is only around £22 per day.
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It's all down to company marketing budget. Spend cash on advertising in the hope someone will buy, or offer a direct discount to those that are buying through a click through - discount being paid for from marketing budget.
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With you on Quidco, I opened an account and then, through them, opened an account with one of the online bookies for this year's National bet. I think I had to wager £25, but I got a fr equivalent bet from the bookies and Quidco paid me £50. I might have the figures wrong, but I know I made a lot, even without the bet on the winner!
I've just booked a Chyrsler Sebring convertible for a week in Florida in March through holidayautos. They are loads cheaper than getting it locally. And last year, on the same trip, I needed a car for a one day one way from Key West to Orlando airport. Cost me just under £30 for a big bus, all drivers and a free tank of gas - which itself was worth more than I paid for rental!!
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i think carrentals.co.uk do so many bookings easycar probably give discounts to carrentals.co.uk customers. Think they done something like 12 million last time i rented.
I've used them before and they always find the cheapest deals in my experience.
Carrentals.co.uk are different as they are like the google of car hire.
In my experience always shop around as cars for rent from other lesser known companies are in some cases supplied by the same company that supplies the bigger companies - just at a lot less.
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