Anyone get in a wreck in a rental car?

@lulu1220 (1006)
United States
June 25, 2009 10:01am CST
Has anyone gotten into a wreck while driving a rental car? If so did you get their insurance? I was traveling recently and had to get a rental car. The one day I was hit by someone else. Ironically I declined the insurance because it was so expensive. So the other driver and I exchanged insurance information as normal (my car insurance covers all damages to rentals). I had to provide an accident report to the rental place and provide them with the other drivers info - his name, phone # and insurance company information. However they did not even try to pursue the other insurance company. They just wanted to deal with mine only. So why even ask for it if they had no intention of dealing with them? By the way, it was not a major accident. The damage was minor. There was some paint scraped off and a small dent in one of the doors. The total repair bill was $500. So I called my insurance company to file a claim and they said they would pay for it and the pursue the other driver's insurance company to recoup the money. He recently tried to file a claim with mine wanting them to pay for the damage to his car. They declined his claim. I am sure he was mad when he got that letter. Another thing..the car rental place can charge you "loss of use" fees too. This is a fee assessed to reimburse them because they cannot rent the car for a certain time period due to the car being repaired. Most insurance companies will not pay this. But if you used a credit card to pay for the rental, they sometimes have a program in which they will pay for damages from a car accident and any loss of use fees incurred. But because of the state I live, they will not pay for the damages (which is fine since the insurance company is taking care of that) but will pay for the fees. So my advice to anyone is if you are going to only have the car for a few days, get their insurance. Anything longer you may consider declining it if your car insurance will cover your rental.
1 response
@killersss (638)
• India
20 Sep 09
no i haven't been in a wreck with a rental car. i haven't got this type of chance in my life. when i have to get my car repaired i go to my own friend who do it for me with reasonable price and at my place only, he doesn't take my car into a wreck or anything.