Car Rental - Insurance

[hellosue]

Hi Everyone, please help!

I am hiring a car while in Orlando and was told I had to have "insurance".

I checked with travel insurance but they only cover "Excess" my "Melb Car Insurance" will only cover me here not in the US.

Seems if you purchase Insurance with the hire company you add another $12 per day. What does everyone do while in the States?
What are my options?

 

[kylieh]

Hi Everyone, please help!

I am hiring a car while in Orlando and was told I had to have "insurance".

I checked with travel insurance but they only cover "Excess" my "Melb Car Insurance" will only cover me here not in the US.

Seems if you purchase Insurance with the hire company you add another $12 per day. What does everyone do while in the States?
What are my options?

The fine print nightmare - really read it. There may be some surprises in there! I can't remember the exact ones we got for our last trip but it added around $20-$25/day with Hertz like LDW and the equivalent of our greenslip which wasn't covered by regular travel insurance as you're operating a vehicle.

 

[battymum]

I think insurance in the states is a little different, I think you are covered for a rental car under your own car insurance.

Unfortunately it doesnt work like that for Australians - you are highly recommended to take the additional insurance - which can pretty much double the cost of the rental.

 

[Chesire]

Not sure if this will help, but when we rented a car in Australia we had to pay the extra for the insurance (which did double the price).
I would really suggest paying for the insurance if your own company won't cover you in the US (our US company would not have covered us here).
Sorry!

 

[Jade+3]

Alamo and National (be sure to change country of residence to Australia) offer policies that include all insurances, as do Travel Jigsaw and Carhire 3000. There may be others, but these are the only ones I am aware of.

 

[WAMUMOF4]

Our car hire through uscarhire.com.uk included all the insurances with no excess for about $52 a day for a minivan. Make sure you also look at being insured if someone hits you is uninsured. pretty sure carhire3000 also offers the insurance included.
I know going through Uscarhire saved us over $1500 compared to hiring through National direct for the same car and same insurances.

 

[Mum from oz]

We used traveljigsaw and they included all the necessary insurances for us Aussies. They also had a pretty good rate. We had no problems using them twice. Our cars ended up being through Dollar.

 

[Sugarglider]

I've always used Alamo and when you price on their website and choose "Australia" it includes the necessary insurance. The price has never been horrible. Alamo seems to offer reasonable prices. Traveljigsaw also prices in the insurance and seems reasonable. I can't think of much worse than having a car accident in the US and the mess to sort out afterwards without insurance

 

[hellosue]

Thanks - now researching your advice

Has anyone had any problems with other drivers or bad experiences whilst driving?