Although the cost of car hire in America is rising, it seems that the opposite is happening in Europe. That’s right. In many European countries, car rental rates are falling.

According to the Post Office Travel Services Motoring on the Continent Report 2009, car rental costs in many European countries are lower than this time last year. For example:

• Greece car hire costs down by 36%
• Sweden car hire costs down by 32%
• Portugal car hire costs down by 21%
• Portugal is also the cheapest place to hire a car in Europe

One of the biggest surprises to me was that the UK rated as the second-cheapest place in Europe to hire a car – with only Portugal coming in cheaper.

Heading to Florida?

Any heading across the Atlantic for some Florida sun will be in for an expensive shock. Rising US costs and a weaker pound mean that the cost of car rental in Florida has risen by a whopping 64% since this time last year. Ouch.

Note: Car hire costs were calculated based on a 3-day hire with 200 miles of motoring. Figures published by Post Office Travel Services.

USA Car hire prices have risen dramatically over the last year, according to new figures published by Abrams Consulting Group, an American organisation that tracks car hire rates.

For example, the average weekly rental rate for a compact car hired at a US airport was $347.44 in mid-June – up from $210.38 at the same time last year. That’s a 65% increase. (Source: New York Times).

The problem is simple – the recession has reduced demand for car hire but car rental companies have reduced their fleets by more than the reduction in demand. The benefit for the hire companies is obvious – higher fleet utilisation and the ability to increase rates, bolstering profits.

However, it’s not simply a question of car hire companies trying to exploit tough times. They’ve had to make changes to survive.  There are three main reasons for this:

1. Secondhand car values have fallen, reducing the value of hire companies cars when they sell them.

2. New car costs have risen in many cases, as struggling car manufacturers readjust their business models.

3. Finance costs have risen and the availability of finance has been reduced, in many cases.

Given all of this, doing what the car rental companies have done just makes good business sense – but there is no denying that the result, for customers, is that rental rates are up.

Significant price rises like this like this make it even more important to shop around and compare car hire quotes before booking.

Airport Connect is a new service from Europcar. It’s aimed at removing the hassle caused by holidaymakers trying to get to the airport with all of their luggage by public transport.

It’s an unfortunate fact that the UK’s public transport network makes carrying luggage very inconvenient. On top of that, who enjoys lugging suitcases between platforms or around the London Underground?

Europcar Airport Connect solves this. Hire a car from your nearest Europcar branch, drive directly to the airport with your luggage and drop off the car – from just £49 each way.

No public transport.

No costly or distant airport parking arrangements.

It sounds like a good plan to me and I would certainly consider using it if I was planning a family holiday by air.

Find out more on Europcar’s website – click here

No-show fees – a penalty fee charged if you don’t turn up for your booking – are common in other parts of the travel industry but until recently have been unheard of in the car hire industry.

Avis has changed all that by introducing what it claims is the industry’s first no-show fee, which it is rolling out gradually throughout Europe.

In the UK, Avis will charge customers who don’t show up a £40 penalty fee. The company claims that this will help it to improve fleet availability. The logic is that the fee should discourage people from booking hire cars ‘in case’ they need them – safe in the knowledge that there is no penalty if they don’t turn up or change their mind.

It will be interesting to see if other car rental operators follow Avis’ lead.

Car rental rates are likely to rise this year – whoever you rent from. That’s the message being given out by major rental companies such as Avis, Sixt, Thrifty and Europcar.

According to a recent article in Fleet News, Avis has warned fleet customers that their daily rental rates may rise by as much as 10% as a result of weaker car residual values, increased difficulties in financing fleet acquisition and fluctuations in the UK-Euro exchange rate. The exchange rate is an important factor, as Tim Bailey of Europcar UK highlighted in the Fleet News article:

Typically the manufacturers buy cars in euros and due to the foreign exchange rate last year, the cars they are buying now are roughly 20% to 22% more expensive than a year ago.

All of this makes it even more important for retail users to use a car hire search engine such as that offered by CarHirePlace.com. The car hire broker who supplies our booking engine searches through more than 450 car hire suppliers to find the best possible price – almost anywhere in the world.

Leading US car hire company Enterprise Rent-a-Car has announced that it is adding 5,000 hybrid rental cars to its fleet. The company already offers hybrids such as the Toyota Prius at many of its US locations, but this latest move will almost double the number of hybrid cars it has to offer.

Enterprise is also designating 80 of its branches as ‘Hybrid Branches’. These locations will have a higher than usual number of hybrid cars available.

Source: AutoblogGreen

Car rental prices could rise this summer, if dire predictions by UK-based Economy Car Hire are accurate.

Economy Car Hire managing director Ron Sexton says that reductions of up to 30% in fleet size by major hire companies may lead to availability problems and price rises this summer:

Every year we have problems with availability at peak times, and this year it will be much worse, especially as holiday makers are leaving it to the last minute to book their vehicles.

This makes sense – and means that using an effective car hire comparison site is more important than ever, if you’re planning to hire a car during the peak summer season (or any other time, really!).

Why pay more than you have to?

Rail fares have just risen by an average of 6% across the UK – with some fares as much as doubling.

Here at CarHirePlace.com, our car rental search engine searches through more than 450 suppliers worldwide for the best car rental deals available. This includes all the major car hire companies with offices in the UK – so I reckon we are well placed to do a bit of train vs. car hire price comparison.

I decided it was high time to see if railway travel can ever claim to offer good value when compared to alternatives like car hire.

To try and present a reasonably balanced picture, I’ve priced up three journeys – each for two people travelling on different types of journey and route over varying periods.

For the sake of averageness, I’ve assumed that the driver is 30 in all cases and have also taken into consideration the journey time required for each type of transport (using theAA.com to estimate road journey times). All prices are as quoted by thetrainline.com and CarHirePlace.com on 27th January 2009.

Car hire prices and rail tickets quoted are the cheapest available options.

1. Newcastle couple enjoying long weekend in Edinburgh

Valentine’s Day is approaching and the time is ripe for a romantic weekend away. Our Newcastle-based couple decide that they fancy a weekend in Edinburgh:

Depart: 5pm Friday 13th February

Return: Early evening Sunday 15th February

Rail Cost: Off-peak return £44.50 per person – £89.00 in total

Rail journey time: 1 hr 30 min

Car hire cost: £68.91

Car journey time: 2hrs 38 minutes

Not a great start for the car hire advocates. By the time you’ve added in fuel, the cost won’t be cheaper. On top of that, the journey takes longer, you can’t have a drink and snack as you drive and you have to pay for parking when you get there.

On the plus side, hiring a car gives you paid-for transport all weekend, unlike the rail option.

2. Day return business trip for 2 people, York – Cheltenham

Our two imaginary travellers need to take a business trip from York to Cheltenham and return, on the same day. They must arrive in Cheltenham by 0930 and will be leaving around 1600.

The trip has been planned at short notice – so they go on Thursday this week.

Depart: Depart 6am, Thursday 29th January

Return: Depart 4pm, Thursday 29th January

Rail Cost: Ouch! £124.00 each – making a whopping £248.00

Rail journey time: 3 hr 23 minutes – arriving at 0923

Car hire cost: £57.34 (including pickup previous evening and dropoff following morning)

Car journey time: 3 hr 25 min

Car hire does a lot better with this journey. Not only are the journey times a dead heat, but the cost of our two business people travelling by rail is around 4 times more than the car hire – even when you factor in some petrol. To add insult to injury, you have to change trains twice in order to arrive before 0930. Not good.

The hire car can also be picked up the night before, saving both people that frenzied, early morning dash to the railway station and allowing them to travel door-to-door to their destination.

Car hire wins, this time, I think.

3. Couple enjoying week’s touring holiday in south-west England, arriving Bristol Airport

This is where car hire really comes into its own. I gave up even trying to calculate the rail/bus/public transport options for this trip.

As anyone who has ever tried will know, touring south-west England by public transport is not at all easy. You can’t stop, detour or go where you want and you are tied to often bizarre and sparse timetables.

On the other hand, the area is perfect for exploring by car. Rural roads, tiny villages and major towns are all within your reach – as are the regions coastal paths, beaches and moorlands.

Here’s what a car would cost for a week in late March:

Pickup car: Saturday, 14th March

Drop off car: Saturday, 21st March

Car hire cost: £129.73

The Result!

I think it’s fair to say that the score is 2-1 in favour of car hire.

I freely admit that where two destinations are joined by a mainline railway service and you are able to travel off-peak, rail can outdo car hire in both cost and time savings.

On the other hand, throw in a few awkward train changes and peak ticket prices and you will soon be longing for the convenient ease and comfort of car rental.

What do you think?

This report from Ireland suggests that some car rental companies are increasing their prices over the Christmas period – profiting from people who need to rent at this time and can’t change their dates to get cheaper bookings.

Of course, there is no regulation on car hire prices and rental firms are free to charge as much as they like if they have sufficient demand. The important thing for you, as a hirer, is to make sure that you get the very best deal available.

That’s when being able to compare car hire quotes is really valuable. Here at CarHirePlace.com, our car rental booking system compares quotes from up to 450 suppliers in 134 countries around the world (including 23 locations in Ireland, such as Dublin Airport).

By doing this, we can offer some of the most competitve car hire quotes on the internet – and give you one of the widest choices of locations and vehicles possible.

To get an instant cheap car rental quote now, just click here.

The fact that UK new car sales are down by 11% this year will come as now suprise to anyone who has watched the news in the last few months. According to the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT), new car registrations in November were 37% lower than the same period last year.

Confidence is down, unemployment is rising and the cost of buying a new car is not attractive – for business or private customers.

In some cases, the costs of owning a car at all might not be attractive – a position I completely understand, living in the centre of a town and being able to walk everywhere I need to go on a daily basis.

Could it be that as with van hire, short-term car hire will become a popular alternative to owning and leasing cars?

The success of schemes like Streetcar in London suggests that non-ownership may be part of the future of car usage. Regular car rental companies now offer very competitive daily rates on smaller vehicles – often all you need for one or two people to travel.

On a more positive note, the SMMT speculated that some buyers may simply have deferred their November purchases to take advantage of lower VAT rates and the market share for smaller vehicles increased, as did sales of diesel vehicles, which accounted for 47% of cars sold in November.