Holiday hire car tips (majorca)

We are breaking with tradition and flying on holiday this year to Majorca with TUI. We normally go in the UK or drive ourselves to France, Netherlands etc.

I’ve plenty of experience driving abroad but not had a hire car over there for 20 years….

There is a basic hire car included with the holiday that we are picking up at the airport.  I’ve heard a ton of stories about hire car problems on holiday

How do I not get ripped off?

Take pics of every panel and a quick video walkaround. If you’ve taken their optional excess cover then all’s good – if not pickup some before you travel. The last few hire cars we’ve had in Spain have been from different operators, all had a bit of damage when we picked them up but nothing said or happened afterwards when we dropped them off, the last two didn’t even get inspected as the hire office was some distance from the car park.

Take a LOT of photos on your phone when you pick up and collect, pointing in the photo to every bit of damage and mark. Ensure that a few of the photos show the location.

Take the same photos on return – clearly showing no damage / no new damage. showing some background as well.

Pay everything on a Credit Card.

Take out a stand alone excess policy – it is cheaper and better than thiers.

3 options.

1. Do as above, take lots of pics and vids, and make sure they see you doing this. Do the same on pick-up and return. Pay everything on credit and not debit card. Accept that you might get a charge anyway and be prepared to fight it.
2. Do the above but have your own excess cover. But accept you may need to pay for the damage before claiming it back off the policy
3. Take out their excess cover, drive it like you stole it and just make sure it has a full tank of petrol on return. That way even if it does have damage it’s their issue and not yours.

Personally, I did option 3 recently. It cost a couple of quid more but for the lack of hassle and the ease of hiring I felt it was the right thing to do.

Take photos.

Loads of them. Mark every single bit of damage on the collection form. Check the tyres. Check the lights (cracked lenses, blown bulbs).

Then do the same when you leave!

Take out their excess cover, drive it like you stole it and just make sure it has a full tank of petrol on return. That way even if it does have damage it’s their issue and not yours.

This. From a reputable company like Avis, National, someone you’ve heard of! Their business model is predicated on drivers taking out their full insurance, so fulfil your part of the deal and you’ll have no issues at all.

Supplier own excess cover a bit more than third-party, but if it’s £10-15 extra you know they won’t try it on as it’s a problem for them to resolve, not you.

I think Tui use Europcar.

yes, I was thinking that for the sake of £20 difference in price or whatever I’d just take every waiver they have going at point of pick up (you can’t purchase ahead of time) rather than doing the third party route.

Good tip to take pictures showing the location as well as the damage!

Take out their excess cover

In my recent experience – this. Yes it is more expensive, but it removes all hassle. I got a car (via Holiday Autos) on mainland Spain last summer and they really pushed their insurance so I just did it – and once I said I would, they also upgraded the car. When I handed it back they didn’t even bother to look at the car. If I hadn’t have taken the insurance out, they would have checked it and seen the massive ding in an alloy that I did.

I only really know the North of the island ie Pollensa area but the streets are so narrow cars are parked almost touching buildings, most cars look battered and scratched, mirrors cracked so unless you have off street parking it will probably get dinged

Buses then hire bikes as it is so hot over there and can’t think of anything worse than driving in Mallorca

Driving in Mallorca is fine

@redmex We are in the north very near Pollensa – we have a drive for offstreet parking but will be leaving it in Pollensa on the street I’m sure

on another topic i’m going to want to hire a roadbike – I guess there are loads of places to do this near pollensa?

I’m a few years out of date but last time I hired in Majorca all the car hire places had “full to empty” fuel policy which is a bit of a rip off as you’ll struggle to burn a whole tank of fuel in a 2 week holiday on the island. You can probably trust tui to have arranged something more sensible tho

There are a few bike shops hiring out bikes and probably shouldn’t be too busy as July August is too hot through the day to ride bikes, Pollensa will be stifling from 10am until midnight but head down to the beach at the Port or Cala st Vicente slightly cooler 4 miles away

on another topic i’m going to want to hire a roadbike – I guess there are loads of places to do this near pollensa?

Half a dozen at various price points, take some of your own tools as some of them really shouldn’t be in the business of bikes at all.

Driving in Mallorca is fine

I’ve done several trips there from the UK and Sweden with no issues, even in larger vehicles (Up to and including V70 and Van sized stuff)

Do you Spain is a comparison site that generally produces some good deals. We always filter for on airport so there’s no messing about with shuttle buses. I tend to get an annual excess insurance policy.

I’ve hired a few times in Mallorca, never a problem. Last time used Hiper near the airport, nice car and no problems, quick minibus to/from airport.

If you read the reviews all get bad ones, especially the big international names. So far I’ve been lucky perhaps.

Unfortunately it’s one of those worry/paranoia things that detracts from the holiday. I’ve got to book hire for Crete tonight, just roll the dice and take what comes.

All I want is an estate that can take 3 full size suitcases and not to get ripped off..

Btw I managed to get a parking ticket at a fairly remote beach on a small, quiet rural road north of Alcudia last time as I had one tyre onto the yellow line which seemed a bit harsh. Trying to figure out the multi screen, multi button ATM machine where you pay is a challenge. 100€

I rent a car in Mallorca many times a year and now pretty much only use vanrell, who operate out of the 6th floor in the carpark.  They are not like the big companies and despite a few issues, have never tried it on.  I have my own excess policy too.  Its great because you walk straight to the carpark, take five mins doing the paperwork and then drive out of the 3rd floor and pay a couple of euros for your ticket to get out.

If you want to pay a bit more and get a really nice car, use Sixt, as you can pre book your car before you fly and when you land you complete the online booking as you’re taxiing in and then literally walk to the carpark and they hand you the keys.

Its a great way to start your trip, as some of the alternative options above can be mind numbingly slow!

PS if you see a speed camera sign, it means there is a camera within 1km.

As I said in the OP I don’t have an option on company – its prebooked with Tui as part of the holiday.

As far as cycling, I’m going on Saturday and currently its saying around 26-29 degrees. Bearing in mind I’m aiming to get up at 6 most mornings and do a couple of hours before heading back to the pool or the beach, I’m hoping it should be OK (it seems to be around 25 degrees between 7 and 11 most days)

I was planning on taking my own pedals and basic tools yes.

We got stung on the petrol re-fuel. It wasn’t absolutely full, as we filled it about 7 miles from the airport! so got stung £30 or something. A joke and a corruption, frankly.

As said, take a million photos, from every angle, when you collect, as they tried to get me for some scratches too. I can’t remember the rental company, sorry, but they were definitely c**ts.

Thread Hijack

We’re hiring a car in Greece, from a local outfit. They appear to want no deposit, and we pay in cash up-front for the 8 days rental. What could possibly go wrong?

https://www.kefaloniaislandrentals.com/

Apparently their a friendly, reliable bunch. Is this just a difference in cultures / attitudes? e.g. people who like to book everything on line, through big companies for assurance, whereas the local style is just chill, borrow a car, bring it back when you’re done?

I guess they are like ‘where are you going to take it?’  and any brits trying to flee the island with a stolen car aren’t likely to get far on a ferry thats probably owned by the car hire guys cousin!

Btw, while cyclists go for the mountain routes in the north, don’t overlook the Manacor to Artà Mallorca Greenway.. disused railway/gravel, popular with hire hardtail crowd.

https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g580282-d7912640-r909952726-Via_Verda-Cala_Millor_Majorca_Balearic_Islands.html

You won’t get the amazing views and hill thrills but could be a nice bimble. Not done it myself, I’m more pool/sea/beach orientated. Cycling is something you do in The British climate thanks

Thread Hijack

We’re hiring a car in Greece, from a local outfit. They appear to want no deposit, and we pay in cash up-front for the 8 days rental. What could possibly go wrong?

https://www.kefaloniaislandrentals.com/

Apparently their a friendly, reliable bunch. Is this just a difference in cultures / attitudes? e.g. people who like to book everything on line, through big companies for assurance, whereas the local style is just chill, borrow a car, bring it back when you’re done?

the short answer is yes, greece seems very different in their approach to car hire.  the recommendation is to always use the small local companies.  we’ve done this on a fair few greek islands including kefalonia.  a quick tripadvisor search on the relevant forum gets you a few answers from experts, and we’ve never had a bad experience, they just dont seem to give a sh1t whether they get scratched or not.  one car on crete had a scratch on the door already and they just said if youre going to crash it, try and make sure its on the same door as the scratch! 😀

on kefalonia, from memory, i think we used greekstones or pefanis.

I used Pefanis in Kefalonia last year and would definitely do so again.

https://www.pefanis-carhire.com

car hire culture definitely different in Med islands (arguably Mallorca included). Yeah the cars aren’t glam but seemingly safe and reliable. Tripadvisor often includes good recommendations for local companies that typically avoid the grift and stress of the sub-mainstream suppliers that crop up on the comparison and broker sites (gold car etc)

Not Spain, Italy, but they definitely tried it on this weekend in Venice. We’d hired a car to go to the Dolomites, and fortunately we took photos and videos of everything. We dropped the car back off 3 days later, and the guy on the counter after doing a “casual” check of the rest of the car, immediately zeroed in on a mark on the rear left wheel. Funnily enough he didn’t bother checking the rest, it was almost as if he knew there was a mark there beforehand… Like I said, fortunately we had photos of everything, and he had to eat his words. So don’t hold back on the photos, they have a timestamp and they could be useful.

(And that said, I have to say the other car I hired in Italy in September last year was fine, and the check-in very casual. Not all hire companies are the same).

Goldcar have a bad rep, but regardless, the above advice is good, spend 5 mins taking pictures and filming the car on collection and drop-off. If they see you doing it, even better, they will be much less likley to try you on.

Some companies can be really casual about it, others will smash your credit card a few weeks later, so it’s prudent to have evidence.

I hired from a local Cretan company last year… they were OKish, though when I went to pay they asked for half cash, half card. I thought this was weird but went along with it. The office had a cash machine outside- their machine of course. I got charged about 40 quid for the withdrawal so felt a bit conned.

Watch out for speed cameras and try not to get stressed about the fact cars are constantly 3 inches from your rear bumper

I hire a fair bit and have my own insurance policy – however hiring under these circumstances I would pay for their insurance just as a safeguard.  Likely to cost a bit – but in comparison to the cost of your holiday very little really

we’re in Mallorca at the mo with tui and the package included a basic europcar rental, we upgraded to a bigger car for an extra twenty euro a day, and added the excess waiver which I think was twelve euro.

fingers crossed all will go smoothly on the return on Saturday, it did last year.

“I hired from a local Cretan company last year… they were OKish, though when I went to pay they asked for half cash, half card. I thought this was weird but went along with it. The office had a cash machine outside- their machine of course. I got charged about 40 quid for the withdrawal so felt a bit conned.”

@grimep i visit crete regularly and ill wager it wasnt one of the local companies recommended constantly on the crete tripadvisor forum?
there are a plethora of well respected local companies on there that wouldnt dream of such a practice.

care to name them to satisfy my curiosity?

I rent a car in Mallorca many times a year and now pretty much only use vanrell, who operate out of the 6th floor in the carpark.

This was who I used after doing some research. They didn’t even look at the car when I took it back, you just leave it in the car park and hand the keys in. No fuss at all.

“i visit crete regularly and ill wager it wasnt one of the local companies recommended constantly on the crete tripadvisor forum? … care to name them to satisfy my curiosity?
”

Yeah, it was Flisvos. Obvs I can’t have proof they’re making money off the cash withdrawals but the machine was on the wall of their office and it was pretty steep, and weird of them to ask for 50/50 card/cash, so that’s my conclusion.

Booking something in Crete for Aug now, haven’t decided who… any recommends while we’re on the subject?! Pick up Heraklion airport

“Booking something in Crete for Aug now, haven’t decided who… any recommends while we’re on the subject?! Pick up Heraklion airport”

@grimep yes my preference is always autorentals, dimitris is now a friend of ours and its always his lad that sorts the car out for us when we go over. be careful tho as theres another auto rental place with similar web address. you want https://autorentals-crete.gr/. (FWIW i havent seen flisvos recommended on the TA forum)

if youre going to compare prices then others to look at are annacars https://www.annacars.gr, autoclub https://www.autoclub-rentals.gr, the best cars https://www.thebestcars.gr/en/

in fact rather than me just keep linking to different places, have a look at the forum thread on it….
https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowTopic-g189413-i424-k14056996-Recommended_car_rental_companies-Crete.html

hope that helps. let me know if you plump for auto-rentals and ill message him and tell him youre a friend of mine. not sure if thatll make a difference but worth a try 😀

hey @sadexpunk, thanks for the info.. I’ll, look into it.

On the plus side, Flisvos didn’t try any other shenanigans and the car actually was a mid-size estate that could take 3 suitcases, just. Just getting that bit right was a relief tbh, I don’t have high expectations.
Oh yeah and another thing…. the screenwash was empty and Crete is dry and dusty so had to fill it- I got a surprise when I lifted the bonnet on a car with 17,000km on the clock- the engine looked about 15 years old. In fact it looked older than the engine in my 2008 heap. I figured that to make extra cash maybe some hire companies rip the engines out of new cars, sell them as brand new and slap a high miler from the breakers yard in

jeez, just looking at august prices, 80+ a day

” I figured that to make extra cash maybe some hire companies rip the engines out of new cars, sell them as brand new and slap a high miler from the breakers yard in”

possibly mate, couldnt tell you for sure, but i know none of the ones i recommended would do that. the TA lot would soon have something to say if anyone reported something like that happening 😀

https://www.terryscarhire.com/

I used these guys the 3 times I went to Mallorca. I found them very good and competitive. I’d definitely use them again.