Cheap Rental Cars in Europe
by Wendy Perrin
Itching for a European road trip but scared off by car rental costs? Conde Nast Traveler's executive editor Ted Moncreiff just returned from a trip to France and Italy raving about NovaCarHire, a reservation service based in the town of Killorglin in southern Ireland that claims to offer "the lowest rates with top car rental companies" while also providing "the highest levels of service."
Ted booked two rentals through Nova--one in Paris, one outside Rome--and came back bowled over by how friendly, competent, and totally reliable the service was. As for the costs . . . a four-day rental of a brand new Fiat mini-van (with built-in GPS) from National Car Rental, picked up and dropped off at the Gare de Lyon in Paris, was $368. And a five-day rental of a brand new Fiat station wagon with automatic transmission (and portable GPS), picked up and dropped off from Auto Europa at Rome's Fiumicino Airport, cost $466. Those were the total prices -- including insurance, tax, everything.
Ted was particularly thrilled that both cars got fabulous gas mileage. Even though he (and his four travel companions) drove the Paris car all the way to the Loire Valley and back, and the Rome car all the way to Tuscany and back, he filled each car's tank only once (shortly before returning the vehicle to the rental agency).
Ted found NovaCarHire through an Internet search. Something about its Web site told him it wasn't some fly-by-night operation and could be trusted. "If you're passing through Killorglin," the Web site invites, "why not call in and pay us a visit? We'll be happy to show you around our reservations center and introduce you to our friendly car rental agents." Ted was also reassured by the fact that the site invites phone calls: "Isn't it unfair how some reservation services on the Internet penalize customers who prefer to book by telephone? Yeah, we think so too, which is why we will not punish you with an extra fee just because you want to book by telephone. You see, we actually enjoy speaking with our customers. So do give our Car Rental Agents a call and use our experience to your benefit." Ted did, and now he would recommend Nova to anyone.
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Oh my! This is great information. I was trying to figure out who I would rent a car from next year for the trip I'm taking in France. This looks like a great site to reserve a car through.
As an aside, I did some searches to see how much cars were, and it was significantly cheaper in my scenario to rent for three days instead of two. When I changed the search from 2 days to 3, it knocked 60 euros off the price!
Posted by: tracker1312 | July 29, 2008 at 11:50 AM
I admit that for short-time rentals, what he found sounds excellent, but in our case, and for others who also take longer vacations, I found that the best deals are in leasing. You always get a new car, no cigarette smell, everything is under warranty, and unlike the U.S. leasing business, this is for anything over 17 days [at least the company I deal with], instead of 2 or 3 years. The contract you sign spells out that at the end of the lease they 'buy' back the car for a specified amount [cost of the car] less the agreed amount you contracted for the lease.
Posted by: vmacor | August 02, 2008 at 05:57 PM
Sorry, I neglected to add that the leasing must be done and paid for in the U.S. prior to leaving.
Posted by: vmacor | August 02, 2008 at 05:59 PM
Wendy,
Thank you for your tip on using Ted's find, Nova Car, when renting in Europe. With this service, I'm saving close to $300 on a 7-day rental from Barcelona Airport for a roadtrip around the Pyrenees! More tapas, Priorat and pintxos for me!
Posted by: kulturvultur | August 15, 2008 at 11:16 AM
Nova Care Rental uses the old bait and switch. They were quoted and made reservations for rental cars for about $400 each to pick up in Rome. When they arrived at the Nova office, they were told that cars at that price were not available, and they were forced to rent cars at almost $1,000 each. Nova was and is a ripoff and should be avoided.
Posted by: surftennis | July 29, 2009 at 03:13 PM