Earn Miles While Renting A Car

Just like you should ensure that you can get the biggest bang for your buck while at a hotel by looking to see if you can earn both hotel and airline points for a hotel stay, you should also explore your options when renting a car.

United has a page full of their preferred rental car providers as well as other providers they have relationships with. The full list is available here.

Each company has their own offers but there seems to be a decent value from a few of the providers like Hertz and Avis where you can earn 75 miles per day and then 50 bonus miles per day. If you book through United.com (which I doubt is a good value) you can earn 150 miles. I don't rent cars that often, for one I am just about to turn 25 so it's quite expensive, but I usually go to places that have good public transit or try to rough it and not have a car if I don't have to so this doesn't do much for me. But if you can get a good rate and provide your United number to earn some bonus miles along the way, it's always a good idea!


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Avis Agrees to Buy Zipcar: Great News For Weekend Travelers

It was announced today that rental car company Avis has agreed to buy car sharing company Zipcar. The deal for about $500 million is a good thing for Zipcar users because Avis is going to use their fleet of rental cars to beef up the number of rentals available for rental as Zipcar's on the weekend.

I think this is a great deal for travelers who might not be able to get a good rental car deal for a weekend city visit or for those under 25 who hopefully won't have to pay an underage card as you only have to be 21 (18 in some locations) to have a Zipcar membership.

If you are visiting a city for the weekend and need a car for some of the weekend and can't find a good rental car rate, this is a great alternative. Even better is you won't have to pay the high prices that come with renting a car from the airport and you won't have to pay high parking charges a the hotel. You will just have to pick up and drop off your Zipcar at the appropriate location and continue your vacation! 

It will be interesting to see how this one plays out, but it has the potential to be an awesome new tool for travelers.

Car Sharing Companies

I live a car free diet. What is a car free diet? Well, that is a person who does not have a car and relies on public transportation, their two feet and other means to get to work, school etc.

I have not owned a car since I was 18. It's not that I can't afford a car. Rather its that a car in Washington, DC would cost me close to $500-$600 a month, with the car payment, insurance and parking space cost. (One building I lived in charged $250 a month for a parking space). I could do a ton of travel with $500 a month.

Well, back to the subject of my post, when I can't use public transportation to get somewhere and I need a car, I sometimes rent cars from Hertz or Dollar and other times I use car sharing companies like Zipcar or car2go. I use each for different reasons.

For example, I rent cars from traditional car rental companies (and bank airline points) when I need a car for more than a few hours. Traditionally, I can rent a car, in Washington, DC, for about $20 on a weekend, when I schedule a few weeks in advanced. However, I can not always plan, when I will need a car. Sometimes, I need to run some errands and need a car for a few hours. That is when I turn to car sharing companies for help.

I use Zipcar in this instance. I pay zipcar an annual membership fee and then pay for each hour, anywhere between $8.00 to $15.00 an hour, to use a car. Unlike rental cars, I do not need to travel to airports to pick up a car. Zipcar's cars are parked on the side of  the street in many locations around Washington, DC and the surrounding counties. In fact, there are 20+ cars in a 5 minute walk of my apartment, including one across the street from my apartment's front door. Similarly, I do not have to pay for gas when using Zipcars, its included in the hourly price.

If you are interested in joining Zipcar, check the various organizations that you are a member of, because being a member of certain organization may have lead to a discount on your Zipcar membership fee or free credits. I gained my membership through my alma mater and save money annually on my membership fee.

Why do I bring this up on a travel blog?

A few weeks ago,  I was thinking that I have never though about using Zipcar when visiting a city on vacation. Zipcar has cars in over 50+ cities around the United States. For example, in San Diego, I wanted to go visit, Cabrillo National Monument, but it would have taken 2 hours via a combination of a tram, 2 buses, and my feet. I decided not to go visit the monument, because I only had 4 hours until the monument closed.

I wish I would have brought my Zipcar card on the trip. I could have rented a car for a few hours (for probably about $30 total) and drove to the Monument in about 30 minutes. One might wonder why I did not rent a car on the San Diego trip from Hertz. The reason was the cost of parking at the two hotels I stayed at cost about $15 a night (or $30 for the two nights). Add in the cost of the car rental for two days and gas, the price for the weekend could have been close to $75. 

For future trips, I will be bringing my Zipcar card with me. One never knows when a spontaneous side trip might arise and the ability to visit something out of the reach of public transportation. I like the ability to take the track less traveled and car sharing programs like Zipcar will allow me to do this.

Have you ever used a car sharing program when traveling?

Rental Car Game

I have an upcoming trip this weekend, but I can not tell you where. It’s a surprise, but I will share my antics next week.

For this trip, I need a rental car. When I first looked at the rental cars, I saw one for Dollar at $65 all in. I though great, I have 2 $10 certificates that are expiring in the next few weeks, so my OOP (out of pocket) would be $45. However, I never booked it. When I went back looking a few days later, the price had jumped to $120. Yikes!

I surfed over to Orbtiz and put in my rental car needs. I found a great rate of $50 all in from a rental car company called Fox. I had never heard of Fox, so I started to sniff around their website. Fox is a rental car company that looks to serve West Coast airports. I booked the rental car immediately. Fox does not partner  with airlines, so no points for me.

If this was the end of the story, it would not be blog worthy. This past weekend, I went back to Orbitz, to check rates and I saw Fox had dropped the rate of the car rental to $45. I quickly cancelled my previous rental car and booked a new reservation at the new rate.

The next day, I check the rate again and it had dropped to $42.00 with Fox. Again, I cancelled my previous reservation (#2) and booked a new reservation.

Yesterday, I checked again and the price on Dollar dropped to $60.00. So, I cancelled Fox’s reservation and booked my reservation with Dollar. I will use my $10 certificates and drop the price to $40.00. In addition, I will bank some miles with United. (Sadly, Delta does not partner with Dollar L, so no Delta Grand Slam Bonus).

The lesson here is to check back on the price of your car rentals. Don’t book once and think that its over. You can save real money by checking back a few times before your trip. Since most car rentals have no cancellation penalty, you can book and cancel over and over again. The same is true with hotel rooms. If you have not selected a prepaid rate, constantly check back to see if the price of your hotel room has been reduced.

Have you played the rental car game?