Budget Car and Truck Rental

Before I bought my new work van eighteen months ago I had an old Ford Transit, and because of the mileage I was doing, it was off the road quite often. Obviously I still needed to work, being self employed, and there is a Budget about half a mile from my home, so I chose to rent a van from them the first time and was so impressed with them that I ended up using them about eight times in six months, before giving up on the old van.

About Budget

Budget combines the strength of one of the world's largest car rental brands together with the detailed local knowledge, flexibility and great value for money you need.

Established in 1958, the Budget Rent a Car brand is licenced within Europe, the Middle East and Africa to Zodiac Europe Ltd (a subsidiary of Avis Europe Plc). Budget locations are either directly owned or franchised to local operators across the region.

Their global network now includes more than 3,400 locations, operating a wide range of cars, trucks and vans in 128 countries.

For your peace of mind all of Budgets vehicles are safety checked and cleaned before every rental. And because they are constantly renewing their fleet you'll be driving some of the very latest model vehicles.

More information can be found at www.budget.co.uk I will not list all the branches for obvious reasons!!

Quality And Choice Of Vehicles

As I said above I have only ever had vans off Budget but these have always been very good. Below is a list of the vehicles available from Budget:

Vans

• Group A - Ford Connect or similar
• Group B - Ford Transit short wheel base or similar
• Group C - Ford Transit long wheel base or high roof or similar
• Group D - Ford Transit luton box van or similar
• Group E - Cargo 7.5 ton or similar

Cars

• Group A - Fiat Punto 1.2 or similar
• Group B - Ford Fiesta 1.4 or similar
• Group C - Ford Focus 1.6 or similar
• Group D - VW Passat 2.0 or similar
• Group E - VW Passat 2.0 auto or similar
• Group G - Mercedes C180 1.8 or similar
• Group H - Mercedes E200 2.0 or similar
• Group M - VW Sharan 1.9 auto or similar

So a very good choice on both cars and vans, also all the cars come with air con - another nice touch.The vehicles all seem to be between brand new and twelve months old at the oldest which is a good thing I think Budget must buy new and get rid at twelve months old as I haven't seen an older vehicle on their forecourt. They are also very clean when you pick them up, which is a nice touch, I have used some other companies in the past and got dirty vehicles but I must say at Budget every van I hired looked like it had been valeted. Another thing is they don't hire them out woth too much damage, another plus point as other companies I have used have been known to hire me vehicles with large dents which isn't very good really in my opinion.

Cost Of Hire

As I have said earlier I have only ever hired long wheel base Transits from Budget ( Group C ), these cost £54.95 per day and when I wanted one for a week they did it at a little over £200 - a very good saving on the day rate. This was however eighteen months ago and the up to date prives are listed below:

Vans

• Group A - £39.95
• Group B - £44.96
• Group C - £60.00
• Group D - Online price not available
• Group E - Online price not available

Cars

• Group A - £35.16
• Group B - £38.95
• Group C - £41.81
• Group D - £59.85
• Group E - £77.90
• Group G - £96.90
• Group H - £140.00
• Group M - £96.90

These are all the prices I could get online, I think there must be some special offers on some cars, that would explain why there is such a difference between some of the prices, also the van prices are if you pay at the rental office, whereas with the cars you get a discount if you pay online and these are the prices listed. The prices for the vans are for 100 miles but the car prices seem to be unlimited mileage.There are also weekly special offers as well as specials for multiple day hire and weekly hire obviously too much too list though. Hopefully this will give you a rough idea on price to compare with others.

Conditions Of Hire

Obviously you need a full driving licence, they will not hire to you if you have a drink driving conviction still on your licence as I overheard someone trying to hire a car one day in the Blackpool office, but I am not sure how they go on if you have points as I cannot find any information and I do not have any points so have not had to deal with this.

You must be over 23 years old (25 for a van) but a young driver surcharge applies if you are under 25. also the mileage restrictions as already mentioned apply for vans, although when I hired vans from them I regularly did over the 100 miles and they didn't bother about this. There is also a clause where you have to pay the first £250 in the event of an accident but something like this is common with all car rental places.

As with most rental companies you have to sign, as part of the agreement, a sheet which shows any damage to the vehicle so that if it comes back with more damage they will know it was you, Budget are very trustworthy with this, unlike some other companies I could mention, but as with all rentals you should walk round the vehicle with them and check everything has been marked down. It is also worth checking for things like a spare tyre as you would be liable for this also were it not noticed before hand, although as I say I have always found Budget to be very honest with this process. I used Hertz once and was charged for the roof ariel being missing and you couldn't really tell that it was unless you knew the type of car, so I am not sure whether it was missing before or not, but I suspect it probably was from what other people have told me about Hertz, but thats another review!!

Other Points Of Interest For Budget Rentals

I suppose one of the main advantages for Budget Rentals is that they have so many branches all over England as well as abroad. This means you can hire a car at one place and drive somewhere and drop it off where you end up. For instance I could pick a car up at Manchester Airport and drive it back to Blackpool then drop it off half a mile from my home.

They also seem to have very helpful and polite staff which is always a tick in my book, if I am spending money with someone I expect them to be polite in taking it off me!!

Another point to make again is that their vehicles are very new and as a result they are up to date models, a definate plus point, as if you have to hire a vehicle it might as well be a new one.

They also have a special term for frequent renters called Fastbreak, I cannot find any information out about this service at the moment but will update if I do, I assume it will involve discounts and the odd free rental etc..

Every vehicle you hire from Budget comes with a full tank of fuel and you are expected to return it with a full tank of fuel, if you do not this results in you being charged by them to fill it at a much higher rate, so make sure you fill it up as petrol is dear enough as it is. When I last hired from them it was £1.50 a litre if they filled it and petrol was well under a pound a litre then so I can't imagine what they are charging now but its probably not far off two quid!!

Conclusion

All things considered I would have to recomend Budget to anyone, I have been back to them time after time which proves some sort of point. I have used other companies in the past both abroad and in this country and Budget are by far the best I have come across, with Adeva coming a very close second. They are a large company but have not lost touch with their customer service like so many large companies do in my opinion, honestly the branch down the road from me, in Blackpool, you would think you had walked in to some small family run shop they are that nice and polite towards you. So all in all if you need to hire a vehicle I would say to you that you can't go wrong with Budget obviously I have only used one branch and there are so many other branches I cannot comment on but from my experience they get ten out of ten!!