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?