Standing at the rental counter in Fayetteville, I had a pen in one hand and a folded sheet of notebook paper in the other. On it were the answers from two phone calls I'd made the day before, and the clerk had just slid the agreement across with three boxes I was supposed to initial or decline. I declined the big one, initialed the rest, and we drove out in a little gray compact that Wes immediately said "smelled like a new phone."
Here's why we needed a rental, what I found out before picking it up, and the one gap neither of our coverages clearly filled.
On a Tuesday in May, the CR-V started making a hum from the front right that got louder with speed. Wes listened to it for about three seconds and said, "Wheel bearing." He was right, which he usually is. The shop quoted $486, and the part couldn't come in until the following Monday. We had a trip to Beaufort, South Carolina, and Hunting Island planned for that weekend, about 560 miles round trip.
Wes's Silverado gets about 16 miles a gallon. At roughly $3.30 a gallon that spring, 560 miles in the truck would have cost about $115 in gas. A compact rental for three days was $164 before gas, but it got much better mileage, and it meant not putting highway miles on the truck he needs for work. We rented.
Call number one: our auto policy
I called our agent and asked what happens if we damage a rental car. Speaking generally, here's what I learned about our policy, which may not match yours:
Our liability coverage carries over to a rental car used for personal driving in the United States. So if we hit someone, we're covered the same way we would be in our own car.
Our collision and comprehensive coverage also extend to the rental, with the same deductibles we have on the CR-V. So if the rental got dented, our policy would pay the repair after our deductible.
What our agent couldn't promise was coverage for the extra fees rental companies sometimes charge after damage, especially "loss of use," which is the income the company says it lost while the car was in the shop, plus administrative fees and sometimes a charge for lost value. Some auto policies cover those and some don't. Ours was unclear.
Call number two: the card
Next I called the number on the back of the card we planned to pay with and asked about rental car coverage. Again in general terms, the card's benefit was secondary, meaning it kicks in after our own auto insurance. It could cover our deductible and some costs our policy didn't. The conditions were: pay for the whole rental with that card, and decline the rental company's collision damage waiver at the counter. Accept the waiver and the card's coverage doesn't apply.
When I asked about loss of use, the answer was that it might be covered, but only with specific documentation from the rental company, like records showing the car really would have been rented out during the repair time. That's something you'd only find out after the fact.
What we decided at the counter
The counter offered three add-ons:
- Collision damage waiver: declined, since our auto policy and the card's secondary benefit covered damage to the car.
- Extra liability coverage: declined, since our own liability carries over.
- Roadside assistance: declined. We'd added roadside assistance to our own auto policy in February for $14 a year. Our agent said whether it follows us into a rental depends on the policy wording, so I didn't count on it, but three days on interstates we know well didn't seem worth paying extra.
The waiver alone would have added a good chunk to the $164, which on a three-day rental would have been a noticeable share of the whole trip budget.
So the one hole was loss-of-use and administrative fees. If we'd had an accident, we probably would have been covered for the actual repair, but we might have been arguing about those extra charges for weeks. We decided we could live with that risk for three days on familiar roads. Someone renting for two weeks might decide differently, and the waiver exists for a reason.
What I did to lower the odds: I walked around the car with my phone recording before we left the lot and again when we returned it, and I made sure the clerk noted a small scuff on the rear bumper on the paperwork.
The trip went fine. Beaufort was lovely, Hunting Island was windy, and the rental came back with no new marks and a full tank. The whole weekend came to $471 including the rental, which is well over our usual target, but the CR-V was in the shop and we weren't cancelling. I'm a receptionist, not an insurance agent, so please make your own two phone calls before you rent.
