Visa - Car Rental Insurance

[DebbieB]

Visa extends rental car insurance benefit

Monday March 1, 1:19 PM EST

NEW YORK, March 1 (Reuters) - Visa USA is extending rental car insurance to all of its consumer credit cardholders, starting on Monday, the association said.

To qualify for the coverage, also known as collision damage waiver coverage, consumers must pay for their rental car with their Visa card and decline the rental car company's collision damage coverage, Visa USA spokesman Kenny Thomas said.

"As a result of these changes, an additional 75 million Visa cardholders, and more than 185 million in total, will now benefit from auto rental insurance," said Al Banisch, senior vice president of consumer credit products at Visa, in a statement.

Thomas said there is no cost to the cardholder to take advantage of the benefit, and Visa only pays to offer the benefit if a claim is filed.

"More cardholders want that (auto rental insurance), so we decided just to make it standard across the entire portfolio," Thomas said.

Visa estimates that by using the insurance, holders will save, on average, more than $10 per day compared with paying for the same type of coverage provided by car rental agencies.


©2004 Reuters Limited.

 

[SnackyStacky]

GREAT news for consumers.

But I really feel bad for those people that work for the rental agencies. I really hope that they re-evaluate those quotas of insurance that agents must sell.

 

[seashoreCM]

Note: Exactly what benefit you get from the credit card may vary from one credit card to another, and I believe even from one Visa credit card to another.

For example one card may also cover "loss of use", or the daily rental for the time the car is in the repair shop, and another might not. (You can argue that the loss of use should be at the same weekly or daily rate you paid for the rental)

Also you must pay for every tidbit of the rental charges, including last minute add on charges such as additional driver, with the same credit card, in order to assure having this coverage. You might even have to buy a road atlas or something to bring the last bit of charge up to a minimum threshold such as ten dollars, if the agency won't accept small credit card charges.

Other useful hints:
http://members.aol.com/ajaynejr/carrent.htm

 

[CarolA]

Personally Loss of Use is line of you know what.

I wrecked a rental car. I asked about that. My company was self insured and they said that if loss of use was requsted they asked for the inventory and rental history for the location for ALL cars in my car class. He indicated we would only pay Loss of Use if EVERY car was rented. The person who processed our claims said that she had had ONE Loss of use payment request and once she asked for the above informaton, the request just died.

The bigger issue here is will the VISA be primary. Lots of times the response is no. First you will have to file with your insurance company. I use Diner's just becuase it becomes primary.

 

[DebbieB]

From the information I have from my Visa Platnium card, it is secondary to your personal insurance. They will basically pay the deductible, your personal policy pays the rest. So Visa is not putting a big risk on this. My card does cover loss of use.

 

[undertheradar]

AMEX did away with this program after a logjam of lawsuits over non-payment. The reneter MUST provide all insurance information and MUST provide all requested documents within a set period of time. The renters who do not have insurance are the only ones who will benefit from this. This is a logistic nightmare for the rental companies, as it now adds another claim step to resolve. Anyone who has an accident MUST get apolice report done immediately or there is failure to comply with the credit card regulations. While loss of use sounds like a scam to some, if you have a fleet of 100 autos and 6 are 15 passenger vans, if two are wrecked and out of service it results in significant loss of income. Check with your insurance agent before renting to know your coverages.

 

[seashoreCM]

The credit card company department that handles the rental coverage benefits also probably asks for the inventory and rental history (fleet utilization) whenever a rental agency bills for "loss of use".

You can, too, if you were not using the credit card benefit, but it might be a hassle fo ryou.

If you were in an accident, the credit card company can't say you are ineligible for the benefit simply because billing for the damage to the car was denied by the credit card company, for example the card went overlimit and therefore for that reason the entire rental wasn't paid for with that card. Actually you should not sign responsibility following any accident and you should not pull out another credit card. Let them bill you and you send copies of the bill both to the credit card company and your own insurance company.

 

[undertheradar]

The handling of such claims will be outsourced, just as AMEX did. The entire program fell apart once the rental car agencies started putting the damage charges onto the individual cards if the renters were slow to provide information to the companies. It got to the point that the cars could not be repaired until all of the "interested parties" signed off on the claims. This did result in lost rental income. The checks coming from AMEX were made payable to the cardholder and the rental agencies. It took some cardholders weeks to get the checks to the agencies. Numerous rental agencies refused to accept the coverage from AMEX, due to the delays in the process. Further adding to the problem is the question of coverage should you allow anyone other than the cardholder to operate the rental. Check with the rental agency before you allow anyone under age 25 to operate the vehicle, as this may not be allowed. In one instance that comes to mind, we had a father rent a Town Car for "himself"(rented for his 17 year old son to go to the prom) and the vehicle was totalled that night with less than 300 miles on the car. Father refused to cooperate with all parties involved and rental agency had son arrested for unauthorized use. While this is an extreme example, these types of damages occur everyday.

 

[CarolA]

Reading the Amex and Visa comments remind me of why I use Diner's Club. It's not cheap, but none of the run around and the claim never hits your personal insurance. They also don't require a police report.

 

[inkkognito]

Amen, Carol!
After reading about Diners Club and the difference between primary insurance, checked with all my cards and they are all secondary. I did find a Mastercard that offers primary coverage, and I have applied for it, so hopefully I will be approved (it's also a fee-free card).
Barb
Visit the Platinum Castaway Club at: www.castawayclub.com

 

[mom_rules]

Our Visa Gold card policy states that Visa Collision/Loss Damage Insurance is the primary insurance and covers CLD up to the vehicle's actual cash value and also the rental agencies loss of use charges. There is a site you can go to to check which Visa cards offer this type of coverage. Ours has no fees. It might be beneficial to check into upgrading your card.

They don't cover 3rd party liability or loss of personal effects (I assume these would be covered under your normal insurance policy?)