When to Pick Up the Car Hire
Hello Car Hire Seekers!!!
This is a very interesting topic that has multiple different ideas to address. In general, the best time to pick up a car hire is during the working hours of the company. Unfortunately, this is not always possible. Not even every airport car hire company works 24 hours and that can make for some problems. There are a few things to consider when selecting your car hire pick up time so that you can save yourself some money off the bottom line. Car hire companies are similar to banks in the way that they charge customers for every little inconvenience they can think of. Therefore, if you have to pick up the car hire outside of the normal business hours, be prepared to pay a service charge. I have listed a few scenarios below that you should try to adapt to if your find yourself in one.
1.
First of all, let me speak about a normal car hire pick up transition. Let’s say your pick up location is the airport. your plan lands at 12:00 and your pick up time is scheduled for 13:00. Perfect! You get there a little bit early and wait about 10 minutes to pick up the car. Too bad life does not operate in theory.
2.
Ok, let’s go back to scenario 1, but give it a little twist. What if your plan is scheduled to land at 12:00 but it is delayed. Now it will not be arriving until 15:00. A full 2 hours past your pick up time. If you do nothing, there is a chance that the car hire company will have been informed about your delayed plane and your reservation will be secure. If this happens to you and you are able to contact the car hire supplier, DO IT!!! If you tell them there is a delay, they will not charge you any extra fee. If you do nothing and you arrive late, they might charge you a fee for being late, or worse, they might give your car away. There is something else that must be said here too. Sometimes, the car hire suppliers do not have a desk at the airport, but they come from the city to meet and greet you. If they have no advanced warning about the plane being delayed, they might charge an extra fee. Although, flight arrival times are easily accessible, not all rental car companies will be so understanding.
3.
Let’s say that your plane will arrive at an airport at 2:00. Let’s also say that the working hours are only 6:00 – 24:00. Now you are out of luck. You will have a couple of options in this case. Option one, ask for an off hours pick up and pay a service charge to get the vehicle. Option two, schedule your pick up time for when the car hire desk will be open and either wait at the airport or a hotel until the desk opens. Maybe you can even send your other travel mates to the hotel on some public transportation and you can wait until the car hire desk opens.
4.
This is the most conservative option…Do not book the car hire for the same day you will be arriving. You can either come back to the airport to pick it up later, find a pick up location near your accommodation or find a company that will deliver the car for free. Sometimes, the conservative option is the most logical. If you follow the advice of scenario number four, you will save yourself a lot of stress and potential problems. Of course, if you are in a rush, this option will not work very well. But if you have some time to spare, go for the relaxed option and get the car hire at a different time.