General car rental advice

[bobfrombob]

Sorry if this is something easily found but I can't seem to locate it. Is there a "how to" or FAQ for renting cars on Priceline with the "name your price" feature? I have hotel experience but never rented a vehicle.

[thereuare]

You select the location, dates, times, and car class and make your bid... what aspect is there that you have a question about?

Where do you need a rental and what are the dates?

Please use the PRICELINE and HOTWIRE links on the board to begin your travel purchases.

[bobfrombob]

Guess I'm wondering how many bids I can make or are there re-bid zones (like changing car type for example) etc. I need a car in Nashville from April 16 to 20.

[thereuare]

It's one bid per car class every 24 hours (ie- you can change from an economy to a compact and bid again for the new car class)

Using our Car Rental Checker what is the best rate (daily and all-in) you're able to find thru conventional booking channels?

How high are you willing to bid and for what car class?

Please use the PRICELINE and HOTWIRE links on the board to begin your travel purchases.

[bobfrombob]

Looks like Budget. $28/day for midsize and $30/day for standard. And that's a pretty good deal. It's about 50% less than most of the competition.

There will just be two of us and mostly around the city so a standard should be fine.

[thereuare]

Since the Budget rate is so good, and assuming it is fully refundable (it usually is, but always double check the terms during the booking process), i would book that while you continue to try bidding on PRICELINE and/or see if rates from most companies come down at all. Please this, or our Support Page link, to make your Budget reservation.

If you want to try bidding, how high would you go at each car class?

Please use the PRICELINE and HOTWIRE links on the board to begin your travel purchases.

[bobfrombob]

I tried to avoid that question last time 'cause I don't have a great answer. We only need a moderately sized car so I'm not really focused on bigger classes. Once the price gets above $50 or $60 a day, it's cheaper to cab I think. But when I see posts from people with successful bids of $10 or $15 a day, that's obviously pretty appealing.

Should I just start bidding on mid class cars at $10 and see what happens?

[thereuare]

Should I just start bidding on mid class cars at $10 and see what happens?

You could, but i think that's highly unlikely as most of the lower priced wins:

1) are for the lower car classes (like compact, economy, etc)

2) are usually when rental rates are cheaper than what you're being quoted above

Regarding #1 above, the rental companies usually have a the largest number of vehicles at the lower car clases since their costs are cheaper to acquire them and because they are the most popular due to customers often looking to spend the least amount of money, so the better deals are often on the lower car classes since that is where they have the greatest amount of excess inventory. As well, should they run out of the lower car classes, they can always upgrade customers to a higher car class, but not the other way around.

So are the lower car classes acceptable? How much more (if anything) would you be willing to pay for one of the higher car classes?

Please use the PRICELINE and HOTWIRE links on the board to begin your travel purchases.