Questions For Visitors From UK..Car Hire

[wee-haggis]

I may not have all the facts here but I was wondering what the avarage costs were for visitors from UK hiring a car in Orlando.
Excuse me if I'm missing something but the basic research I did indicated that some of the UK visitors are paying an arm and a leg for car rental and I can't see why?
I looked at a couple of websites that UK visitors used (Airline Network and Florida Car Hire)and found that for a 10 rental of a Minivan it would be 263 and 386 pounds resepectively.
I also did a couple of searches on the Message Boards and came to the conclusion that these amounts for a 10 period was average or maybe even a bit lower.
Maybe I'm missing something or I'm unaware of certain restrictions for UK visitors but I (as a non American...from Canada)just a booked a minivan at Alamo for 10 days and using one of the many available codes got it for $399 (about $200).
The rates at Dollar and National were very similar.
I did an experiment and pretended to be a UK resident and filled in all the booking forms and the pricing came out to be exactly the same!
Is it something to do with Insurance (I don't have to pay any extra to Alamo because I'm covered by my own insurance and Amex which I booked with)?
I'd be interested in hearing from the UK folk what their costs were/are.

 

[vernon]

It is all to do with insurance.
In the US ( and I presume Canada) there is a much higher coverage for damages and being sued than we have and our domestic insurance would not cover for this, so we have to take out some auxillery insurance to cover for that possibility. To rent direct from US companies we would have to take out their insurance coverage which is incredably high. It is usually much more cost effective for us to hire a car from here on an "all inclusive" package. I've found recently that Ebookers and Expedia both are close to the best value. Just to give you a rough guide an economy car with full insurance booked in this fashion should come to about £155 (US$ 250 approx)

 

[Elle]

Further to my posts on another thread I need to clarify that Florida Car Hire has ceased trading! The web site is still live and able to take customers money but no vouchers will be issued!!

The cost of £155 for a weeks hire for an economy car is about right, but please also be aware that in the light of recent happenings car hire rates will be going up.

Elle