If you’re thinking about hiring a car while on holiday (as a lot of people do), you might want to consider budgeting just that little bit more than you’d originally anticipated. It can turn out to be a very expensive affair and, while it might be worth it to have the freedom to explore your new location, many people find themselves shocked and confused by the procedures involved in renting a car in a foreign country, including the difficulties you might find when trying to get extra cover (such as collision damage waiver insurance).
Despite this, there are many similarities between rental car insurance and its more common counterpart. The excess is one of the most important things to consider when looking for insurance – that is to say, the amount you have to pay on any claim before your insurance company picks up the rest of the bill (if, for example, you have a crash and the repair bill comes to £250 with a £100, you’ll pay the first £100 and the insurance will pay for the rest; if it’s less than £100, you’ll pay it all). However, it’s generally much higher for rental cars, and it’s not at all uncommon to find excesses around the thousand pound mark. This is a huge amount of money, and one that many drivers feel uncomfortable being liable for.
As such, many people choose to take out collision damage waiver insurance, or CDW insurance. This is a policy that aims to lower your excess by charging you a daily premium – in effect making you pay up-front for not crashing the rental car. As a rule, the more you pay, the lower your excess will become (the the point where a fairly expensive ‘super’ collision damage waiver insurance policy will remove it completely), but this can often work out to be extremely expensive, especially if you consider that it’s added on per day of cover you need.
An alternative to buying your cover at the counter is to make sure you’ve organised it via an online collision damage waiver insurance provider before you even set off on your holidays. This can work out cheaper (and save time as well, as you don’t have to worry about figuring out complicated insurance forms while you should be focusing on enjoying the beaches and sunshine), and typically comes in two options – either a short term plan, which will allow you to purchase your cover by the day or week, or a long term annual plan, aimed at people who rent cars abroad on a fairly regular basis (at least more than once a year). While the latter can sound expensive, twelve months’ worth of cover is a long time, and it can save you quite a hefty sum of money if you think you’ll be using the services of a rental company more than once.
Whichever you choose, collision damage waiver insurance can be a good way to keep some peace of mind when driving abroad, allowing you to forget about spending a fortune on repairs if you crash and instead giving you the opportunity to focus on having fun on your holiday.