Importance of Rental Car Insurance
I want to tell you about the importance of taking out the insurance on your rental car, from the rental car company. Most people don’t think anything will happen when they rent a car, so they don’t want to pay for the additional insurance. But last month, when my husband and I were in San Francisco for work, something did happen. I was very grateful to have rental car insurance.
Personal Experience
One afternoon we decided to do the tourist thing, we went down to Fisherman’s Wharf and then over to Chocolate Square to visit the Ghirardelli chocolate factory. While visiting Chocolate Square our rental car was broken into! We had only been in there for about twenty minutes, and we went outside to find the back window completely smashed. Thank goodness I had taken out the rental car insurance. Having the insurance really made a not-so-good situation a little bit better.
Rental Company Insurance
When you take out the insurance through the rental car company, you can turn that car back in – no questions asked. So, I called Enterprise and explained what had happened. Enterprise had us in another vehicle in twenty minutes at their closest location, and then we drove an hour to the location by the airport. This was to get a rental car close to the same caliber of the rental car we previously had. But within 1.5 hour, we were back on our trip and we didn’t have to pay any money! All we did was take the busted-up car back to Enterprise, we got a new car and we were able to enjoy the rest of our trip. When you take out the rental car insurance, that’s what you get to do. You can read more about the types of coverage offered by Enterprise on their website.
Rental Insurance Under Your Policy
If you choose to reject the insurance from the rental car company, which a lot of people do, you have to pay any damages out of pocket. Then you must try to get the money back from your insurance company minus your deductible which can be over $1000 depending the the deductibles you have selected. You don’t drop the car off and walk away like my husband and I did. Read our previous blog post: Does my Car Insurance Cover Me in a Rental Car
Summary
I wanted to explain our specific example to all of you. As a reminder, while it’s not pleasant to spend the extra money – especially when you’ve already spent a lot of money on your trip, it’s worth it to make a bad situation a little bit better.