Check all the Fees when you Rent a Car

Filed in archive on January 23, 2006

Kelli B. Grant of Smart Money reports that we need to take a closer look at the total cost of car rental before we make a decision.

She says, "According to a 2005 report by Consumer Reports, these added costs can easily account for 30% of your total rental bill. You might, for example, get socked with a $4-a-day fee to fund downtown development projects like Kansas City's Sprint Center Arena. (Look for this fee when renting from the Kansas City airport.) And when renting at the Reno/Tahoe International Airport, look for an 11.11% "airport concession recovery fee," which is charged by rental companies to offset the costs of using the airport property."

So even you?re checking online prices, it can very easily change totally when you get to the rental place of business and find out that the price did not include all of the added costs.


The reason behind a lot of this reports the Daily Traveler is this:

"Desperate to raise tax revenue without offending a possible voter, politicians are slapping fees of up to $10 onto car rentals, Wednesday's Wall Street Journal reported (access free all week). That could double the price of some economy rental cars. As of this August, there were 44 rental-car tax proposals pending or approved by local governments, up from just three on the books in the beginning of 2004, according to Enterprise Rent-A-Car Co.," reporter Avery Johnson wrote. Politicos know that most airport car renters are not locals, so they're acting as though it's slop time at the trough."

What you can do:

Consumer Report offers these tips to protect yourself and find the best deals on rental wheels:

Stick with multibrand travel sites such as Orbitz.com and Travelocity.com. Skip the rental-car company sites.

Before you make a reservation on any site, understand the requirements and cancellation penalties.

When you make the reservation, always check for available
discounts.

Keep track of the total cost of the rental, including taxes, fees, and surcharges, so that you know what the bottom-line cost of the car is likely to be. None of the multibrand Web sites lets you make side-by-side price comparisons that include all those extras.

Use these techniques and at the very least you will have the information on hand to make an intelligent decision without any surprises or pressures to buy.