The newspaper looked into the figures after a regular visitor to Guernsey voiced concern over how expensive hire car charges were on the island and warned tourists not to use third-party websites when making bookings.
Jane Clark’s parents live in Guernsey, and she visits at least three times a year.
‘I’m passionate about Guernsey. I think it’s one of the best places in the world to visit, but why is hiring a car in Guernsey so ludicrously expensive?’ she said.
‘I came in July to stay for four days with my children. It cost £270 to hire the most basic car on offer. Various friends of ours try and come over, and they end up hiring e-bikes because they can’t afford the car hire. I feel as if we are already over a barrel with flight costs coming to Guernsey and car hire is the nail in the coffin.’
Mrs Clark said she had then rebooked for August using a third-party website and was quoted an eye-watering figure for six days’ hire.
‘I went through the website Economy Car Rentals, and it was £500, and I was just absolutely horrified,’ she said. ‘I have always generally gone through them and thought I’d got a really reasonable price.’
Mrs Clark ended up contacting one of the island’s four car hire companies directly and found she could hire a car for just under half the quoted price, but still said this was expensive compared to elsewhere.
‘I felt particularly shocked when I booked car hire for five days in Sicily in October. It is costing €52, including the best level of insurance available,’ she said. ‘My brother also hired a car in Mallorca recently for €170 for a family of five for seven days.’
The Guernsey Press investigated car rental prices for a week’s hire during August with the four companies who operate here and compared them with their prices in the UK and Jersey.
The cheapest car available in Guernsey cost £282 through Europcar, compared to £134 at Gatwick and £190 at Southampton Airport. The cheapest car in Jersey was slightly more expensive.
The newspaper contacted all four local rental companies, Avis, Hertz, Sixt, and Europcar, but only Europcar replied.
Managing director Guy Plante said he would strongly defend car rental as being of substantial value to island visitors and the tourism industry and there were currently economy-size cars available in Guernsey from between £35 and £40 per day.
‘Seven days’ car rental is currently equal to one night’s accommodation in a leading hotel and the daily rate is roughly equivalent to the cost of one or two taxi fares,’ he said.
‘Ensuring the customer experience is one of excellence and efficiency for passengers arriving in Guernsey is imperative.
A close working relationship with the airport and the industry overall is of paramount importance to enable car rental companies to ensure this.
I would confirm that this is the case today and the level of customer care supplied is exemplary compared to many other car hire locations.’
He added that there were a number of factors at play that meant Channel Island prices were higher than on the mainland.
‘To start Jersey and Guernsey are all independent licences and don’t have the economies scale,’ he said.
‘And because of the change in travel trends there has recently been a substantial oversupply of rental fleet in the UK, which has caused a heavy discount war creating quite frankly unrealistic prices.’
He said that there were also significant differences in insurance and excess fees with Guernsey Europcar cars having zero excess with full damage cover for the hirer, whereas UK rates generally had a £1,500 to £2,000 excess with an additional daily charge of £15 to £20 to reduce this to zero and this needed to be added to any basic price shown to give an exact comparison.
Mr Plante said that most Guernsey companies had moved to this way of charging during the pandemic and that prices in Guernsey reflected good value for money.
‘During Covid there with restrictions on handing over keys and inspections so we went to a model of including damage in the price,’ he said. ‘Our customers much preferred this model of not having the Sword of Damocles hanging over them and we have kept this every since.’
He also warned islanders and visitors to be careful of third party booking sites.
‘We do not deal with them for the reason their rates are marked up massively with commissions,’ he said.
‘It is always recommended to book direct.’
Four car hire companies operate in Guernsey, Avis, Europcar, Hertz, and Sixt.
The Guernsey Press compared the costs of hiring a car for one week from noon on Wednesday 27 August to noon on Wednesday 3 September.
The average price of the cheapest car for that period across the four companies that operate in Guernsey was £362.74 with the cheapest being £282.31 and the most expensive being £427.
The cheapest using www.economycarrentals.com was £448.
All four companies also operate at Gatwick. The average price for the cheapest car offered by each company there was £152.50.
Three of the companies also operate at Southampton Airport. There, hire for the same time period, averaged £198.
These prices take no account for the exact model of car on offer or added cost like insurance, to reduce excess, or for excess mileage.
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