If you are planning ahead for next summer’s holiday, you can take advantage of this year’s prices for next year. Until the end of this year, Dec 31st, the Alamo rates for next year (from April 2011) can be booked up. If you want a bigger car, or have a longer trip then this is the time to take advantage and get a reservation made. Remember, if your trip dates are a long way off, give us a ring in the office and we can take your reservation without requiring full payment or even a deposit. The final balance will not be due until 5 weeks before your travel date. Budget cars are also available to be booked at this years price for the immediate future, but this could change at any time.
Posts Tagged ‘Budget car hire Florida’
Book 2010 rates now for 2011
Thursday, October 14th, 2010Budget voted ‘Preferred’ car hire company
Tuesday, July 13th, 2010A recent survey published by Florida Homes and Travel has found that Budget Car Hire is the most ‘Preferred’ car hire company for villa owners in Florida. With over 45 percent of the vote, Budget was the clear winner, with Dollar Rent a Car in second place with 32 percent. Alamo was third with just 13 percent of the vote.
In the same survey American Airlines was ranked as the best airline overall, with Virgin Atlantic a close second, and British Airways fifth (and this was before all the strikes)! The airlines were ranked on a scale of 1 – 5, with 5 representing Excellent, and 1 representing truly awful, in 6 categories: punctuality; security; food; cabin crew;entertainment and overall service. However, Virgin Atlantic was the most popular airline in terms of flights taken.
Drivers under 25 – a new option!!
Wednesday, June 23rd, 2010We have great news for all our drivers under 25, now you have a new option to choose from! Alamo has released its own Young Driver Package for this age group which works exactly the same way as the Budget Young Driver Package we have previously discussed.
Drivers between the ages of 21 and 24 must book the car in their own name, and use the Diamond insurance package only. Once you have chosen your car, proceed to the next page and make sure the Young Driver box is selected with a tick. If you then press continue, the website will add up the total cost of your order for you and you can book the car.
Unlike Budget, where the lead driver must also have a credit card in their own name, Alamo is happy to accept a VISA debit card so this really expands the options we have available to clients and is great news. Alamo has many locations around Florida, particularly Central Florida and the Disney area where it has the Disney Car Care Center, amongst others. The cost is currently £62 per day, and as it is all paid up front and includes the fuel you will have nothing else to pay on arrival!
As with Budget, other drivers over 25 can be included at no extra charge making this a great option for parties with a younger driver, or families with older children requiring some freedom…
Alamo is a popular choice with many clients because of its ‘Choice Product’ where you choose the car you want from the available models in that category, a really useful feature for making sure you can fit all your luggage in.
Spring Offers
Friday, May 14th, 2010We currently have some great upgrades on offer for bookings taken before the end of June with Alamo and Dollar. These are guaranteed upgrades, so you if you book a compact car with Alamo or Dollar, you will automatically recieve an intermediate size car. Likewise, if you book an intermediate size car, you will receive a full size. This is slightly different to the Budget upgrade offer which is always complimentary and is subject to availalbity on the day.
Our Budget cars have been reduced by £5 per week for all bookings placed before the end of May, so get them booked while the price is good! The reduction applies to all cars picked up before 31st March 2011! If you would like to book up but pay later – please email or call the office and we can take your booking over the phone for you, securing that great rate in advance.
Spring forward with Upgrade Offers
Tuesday, April 6th, 2010As we finally start to see leaf buds and blossom on trees, we can look forwards to the weather warming up (we hope). With a bit of Spring fever, Florida car hire companies have released upgrade offers for collections between now and June 30th!
The special offer for upgrades with Alamo and Dollar are guaranteed, so if you want an Intermediate 4 door car you can book a Compact 4 door – you will be sent a voucher for an Intermediate.
Budget’s offer is always complimentary, and is subject to availability on the day. So with Budget you should always book the minimum car size that you require.
With all 3 suppliers, the car categories included in the upgrade offers are; Compact to Intermediate, and Intermediate to Full size. Budget have one more category of Full size 4 door to Premium 4 door.
Car hire to get you to your cruise
Tuesday, February 16th, 2010Many cruise passengers arrive in Florida via Miami, Orlando or Tampa airports and then choose to hire a car to get the most out of their time before they embark or after disembarkment.
Because of the lack of space at port locations in Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Port Canaveral and Tampa, car hire companies such as Dollar or Alamo do not have depots actually at the ports, but most usually provide a complimentary shuttle between the airports and ports.
In Miami, a free shuttle is run by Dollar/Thrifty and Alamo from the main international airport locations to the port and again in reverse. Some hotels also run shuttles both from the airport to the hotel, and from the hotel to the port, however, in higher end hotels the price for the shuttle seems to boost the room rate, while in cheaper hotels, the shuttle appears to boost numbers! Regular cruise passengers advise that you don’t choose your hotel by access to the shuttle, rather choose a great hotel in a great area and make the most of your time in Miami. If you have hired a car for one night, you can then return to the airport to drop off the car and use the shuttle. Budget car hire don’t offer a shuttle between the port and the airport and also don’t offer rentals for less then 2 days.
For passengers arriving at Fort Lauderdale the situation is very similar. Although there is a downtown Dollar/Thrifty location close to the port, you still have to get the shuttle to make the last bit of the journey. There are paid shuttles that run between Port Everglades and Miami International, and Fort Lauderdale and Port of Miami. You can expect to pay at least $15 per passenger for these shuttles, but at least the price is fixed, as opposed to a taxi which will be on a meter.
At Port Canaveral the car hire depots are about 3 or 4 miles away from the port and once again, they run shuttles to and from the port. With the closest airport being Melbourne International, this is not regularly used by UK cruisers. A taxi from Orlando International to Port Canaveral will probably start at $100. While a one day hire using Dollar would be around £30 to £50 depending whether you have an economy car or a large minivan 7 seater. Once again, experienced cruisers drop off their party and luggage at the port, and then return to the car hire depots to get the shuttle back without luggage!
At Tampa, the cruise terminal is quite new and the car hire companies have been slow to provide shuttles. You will most likely have to get a taxi either from the airport or your hotel.
There are some great cruise forums out there where you can get really valuable advice to help you get the most out of your trip and make it as smooth as possible.
Daytona 500 side trip
Saturday, February 6th, 2010February 14th is Valentines Day for some people. For others with a rather different love, of cars, it is the day of the running of the 52nd annual Daytona 500 at Daytona International Raceway Florida.
Here, one of our regular clients tells us of his visit in 2009.
The race is 500 miles long which is 200 laps of a banked oval with cars, which look very similar to the every day American drivers, circulating at 200 miles per hour. ‘Awesome’ as the Americans say! As my wife and I had done the trip to Florida many times before we hired a Mitsubishi Gallant from Budget Rent a Car through Carhireflorida.net. The nice touch with carhireflorida.net is that Elle is able to pre-register the car before we arrive and we go straight to the garage at Orlando International Airport thus avoiding all the long lines at the rental desk which is not what you want after a 9 hour flight. The other nice touch about this system is that you get none of the high pressure selling trying to upgrade the car etc. Literally within 2 minutes you are underway and I would recommend everybody to do this. [Thank you for the plug John!]
A few days were spent before the race at our house in Kissimmee doing maintenance jobs etc before 2 very good friends of ours joined us to go and see the race. They both race back in the UK with Dave sharing my car in speed hill climbs. After a couple of days showing them around the sites it was time to go racing.
We left home on the Sunday morning, after a leisurely breakfast, at 9.00 am and enjoyed an equally leisurely drive on the Greeneway toll road to Sanford and then on the Interstate 4 to Daytona. For the previous 4 days rain has been forecast for the race but we have a nice warm sunny day and hopefully it will stay away although a 60% chance of rain is forecast!
We arrived about 11.00 am and eventually found our free car park at the back of the Airport. After parking and walking a ½ mile to the complimentary school bus ride we get on a bus and are taken to the circuit. Daytona is a 2 mile steeply banked oval and is huge with seating for about a quarter of a million people. Every ticket sells including the tickets from the touts outside the circuit. If you haven’t been before you must get a cushion to sit on as the aluminium seats get a bit hard after a few hours. Every team has a trailer selling goodies including cushions and our friends purchase one each. We get to our seats at about 1.00 pm and start to watch all the pre race show including a live rock show, air display, marching bands and the driver parade.
After the very moving National Anthem was sung the inevitable “Gentlemen start your engines” was proclaimed by the Governor of Florida at 3.00 pm. The Pace car, driven by Tom Cruise of ‘Days of Thunder’ fame, leads the pack round for 2 or 3 laps and the green flag is dropped. The noise is amazing and is similar in volume to being by the side of a Jumbo jet taking off. The sight of 44 odd NASCAR race cars each having over 800 horse power and dashing into turn 1 which is banked at 37 degrees is stunning. For the first 15-20 laps everybody stands up when the cars go past but then the race begins to develop some semblance of order and we are able to watch the race all the way round the circuit on a big, and I mean big, screen TV. The inevitable yellow flags come out every time there is an incident, then every body has to follow Tom Cruise around the track in the Pace car.
We are supporting Juan Pablo Montoya, ex Formula one driver, who this year has gone into team ownership as well as driving and he starts to make good progress but is involved in several incidents and slips back down the field. After several more incidents it starts to get a little cloudy and the spot lights at the track are gradually turned on so that you would not even notice that it was getting dark.
The big crash of the day came between Dale Earnhardt Jr and Brian Vickers coming off turn 2 where we were. The eventual winner was able to pick his way through the pack, which was spinning everywhere, without any damage. Ten or more cars were put out of the race at this time. The inevitable rain brought the Daytona 500 to an early finish and Matt Kenseth was declared the winner after leading only the last green-flag lap of an eventful Sprint Cup series season-opener. Kenseth overtook Elliott Sadler entering turn one to lead the race for the first time all night on lap 146, right before Aric Almirola made contact with Kasey Kahne on the backstretch, bringing out the caution flag for the eighth time during the day. While running behind the pace car, a slight drizzle that had kept teams with an eye on strategy and the weather radar, transformed into a heavy downpour that ended up washing out any chance for Kenseth’s rivals.
Following 20 minutes of waiting under the red flag, the 2003 Sprint Cup champion was declared the winner. Given that the race was past its halfway-mark and with the radar not showing any hope of the rain stopping, NASCAR decided to make the result official after 380 of the scheduled 500 miles.
We now leave the circuit to be taken back to the parking lot by the ubiquitous yellow school bus ready for the journey home. Our friends went home a few days later and then we settled down to relaxing in Florida for another 4 weeks. The Daytona 500 is a great day out for any motor enthusiast.
www.daytonainternationalspeedway.com for details.
Christmas is coming… Get your booking in!
Monday, December 14th, 2009I am sure you have noticed the signs, the shops are full, there are carols on the radio, and festive decorations everywhere – Christmas is coming!!
If you haven’t yet made your Florida car hire arrangements for the holiday season you may wish to attend to it as a matter of urgency. Popular 4 x 4 vehicles are nearly sold out, as are many of the larger, luxury cars.
Budget Rent a Car have recently taken delivery of a new fleet and we have clients reporting cars with less than 10 miles on the clock. That is like having a brand new car for Christmas!
If you do book a Budget car, don’t forget to take advantage of the pre-registration facility. You don’t want to be spending your precious holiday queuing up at the hire desk in the airport. Pre-register at least one week before arrival and then you can swan over to the car park booth at your leisure to collect your car. You will be at Disney World before you know it!
If you need any help selecting your car please give me a call on 01428 741438, or drop me an email: admin@carhireflorida.net.
Intermediate Sports Utility Vehicle
Wednesday, November 11th, 2009The compact SUV vehicles are very popular with clients for Florida car hire. They give a nice high ride with good visability, and with the cars in Florida often being so much bigger than in the UK, it can help with confidence on the road.
The Toyota RAV 4 is the illustrative car for Thrifty car hire in this category. The RAV 4 was recently ranked 4th out of 26 compact SUV’s in America by U.S. News. “The RAV4, last redesigned in 2006, is one of the most well-rounded vehicles in its class”
The Saturn Vue is the example provided by Alamo car hire for the Intermediate SUV category. U.S. News ranks the Saturn Vue 7th out of 26, “redesigned last year, the VUE offers one of the best combinations of style, a comfortable interior and impressive performance in its class.”
Dollar Rent a Car continue their strong link with the Jeep, now the ‘Liberty’ has replaced the very popular Cherokee. Edmonds.com comments on the current styling of the car “The cute styling of the first Liberty has been replaced with a more traditional, square-jawed Jeep look, and the cabin boasts more available luxury features such as rain-sensing wipers, remote starting, driver memory settings and a power-sliding sunroof made of canvas that allows a huge opening. There’s also more room for backseat passengers, thanks to a 2-inch wheelbase stretch.”
Budget car hire’s star of this class is the Ford Escape. Edmonds.com believes this has been the best selling compact SUV of all the makes and models on offer. “Ford successfully combined the styling and four-wheel-drive capability of a traditional SUV with the size, practicality and driving characteristics of a midsize car.”
Whichever supplier you choose your intermediate SUV through, there seems no doubt that they are fun to drive. Do be aware though that they don’t have the same luggage capacity as the larger standard SUV. Although technically seating 5 people they would suit 4 adults and a child better than 5 burly adults.
Budget prices rolled over again!!
Monday, October 19th, 2009Great news for all our clients, our Budget car hire rates have been rolled over again!! Take advantage of these fantastic rates now to book your car for your next trip – right around to next December!! Remember, if you want to book now and pay later, just give us a call and book by phone – it is that simple!
Are you looking for Halloween fun while you are in Florida
