I have queried with economy car hire and they confirmed that the 450 excess would not have applied in the event of an accident, however, my signature was on the form with the 450 excess specified.

The guy in the car park was the one who got stroppy with us........

I have read some reviews on this site for a company called Travel Rent Car Hire which operates out of Faro Airport. I thought I'd add my experience to them.

In April I rented a car which had a fault on it. On arrival at the airport I was told (and shown) that the problem was so minor it made no difference to the running of the car at all and on that basis I accepted it. When I was driving on the motorway in torrential rain and I found that I could not operate the windsceen wipers, I realised that that wasn't the case!

Since my return home I have been trying to get satisfaction from Travel Rent but to no avail. It seems that they are quick enough to fob you off with a defective car but not so quick to compensate you for a fault which could have proved fatal. As they operate in Portugal and are refusing to deal with this, there is nothing further I can do I except to say to everyone who is looking to hire a car at Faro Airport - be very careful about which company you rent from!

Bristol did you rent direct from Travel Rent or through a UK company? If you did rent through a UK company you should take the complaint up with them.We have used travel rent many many times with no problems whatsoever, but booking through http://www.economycarhire.com in UK. I think on 2 occasions we have booked direct with travel rent but also had no problems.

I have also used Travel rent quite a few times but via Economy Carhire in the UK. Never had a problem with their cars but then again its never rained when I have been in the Algarve

I would take it up with the UK company you booked with(if you did).

I know its not your priority when after a long journey and you arrive in Faro, but I always take 5 mins to check any car I hire properly, lights, wipers, tyres etc as it can be a serious pain if you find out later on something is faulty. I hired a villa once and the car came with it and it was only when driving along the EN125 that the gearstick came off in my hand....which was nice This was a bit inconvenient.

But a complaint to the UK compant would be a good idea possibly.

Lummie

I have used economycarhire.com twice before as my car hire booking agents for the Algarve with no problems. For my holiday in the Algarve this month though, their quote wasn't as competitive, even taking the zero excess into account. Consequently, I found it better value to buy an annual European excess insurance policy from insurance4carhire.com (underwritten by AIG UK) for £49 and hire the car via Auto-Europe.co.uk with just the basic insurance and CDW cover. The excess is a steep £600 in the event of damage to the car but that would be refunded by the insurance policy and the total cost still came in a couple of pounds under economycarhire.com's quote.

The main advantage is that it provides excess refund cover for any car I hire in the next 12 months in Europe and also covers damage to the undercarriage, roof, tyres and windows, things that are not covered by most car hire suppliers excess waiver insurance (including economycarhire.com's suppliers). Policy refund limits are £2,000 per claim, up to a maximum of £3,000 in any one year so just thought I would highlight this as it might be a good option for other HT members who holiday abroad several times a year and hire a car when they do.

Hi all,

I am returning to the lovely Algarve in sept and I am having some difficulty in finding a good price for a hire car for ten days. Some are doing deals for 7 days but all quotes are much dearer for ten. Can anyone help please.

Many thanks Jance

There are 12 pages about car hire in a post above this one. They are full of good info. Personally I am going with http://www.carhirealgarve.net/ I choose not to have full insurance then take car hire excess insurance with http://www.worldwideinsure.com/car-hire-insurance.htm?partnerID=0&partner=null. I have booked for 26th Aug but I haven't used them yet so I cannot recommend

just returned from algarve-booked car hire thro economycar hire using drive4 fun -n0 problems at all-guy was waiting at airport,car was directly outside-would def use again

econy car hire have just posted travelrent's prices for 2009 and they appear to be very competative
cheapest on the website at present

I am planning a trip to Lisboa for two weeks with a friend, and we are not sure about car hire in Portugal. What´s a reasonable price per day?
Thanks.

Let me get this straight - are you planning to use the car within Lisboa or to get away from Lisboa??

We´ll rent it in Lisboa but we want to go for small trips out from Lisboa perhaps.

If you want to rent it from the airport try http://www.economycarhire.com they are reasonable and have no excess on their insurance, so piece of mind should someone bump you, have a look at their website. We use them from Faro, but I do know they rent from Lisboa as well.

Thanks for the suggestion, I will take a look and see if we can find it from Lisboa.
Thank you!!

Having a car in Lisboa is one of the worst ideas I've seen on this board! It's OK to hire one and then head out to somewhere else but the traffic in the centre (basically everywhere between the airport and the river) is like the chariot race from Ben Hur for most of the day and parking will be a nightmare. If you're staying in Lisboa and just want to make a few day trips out don't bother with a car, use public transport which is very cheap.

Ok, Steve, thanks for the advice, I think I´ll use piblic transport within Lisboa and perhaps rent a car to make a few trips out of Lisboa.

For public transport within central Lisboa see http://www.carris.pt/en/index.php

Carris operate the trams and yellow buses in the city, several of the passes they sell also include the Metro and the Lisboa Card also includes museums. Buses in the outer suburbs may be operated by other companies such as Rodovaria de Lisboa and these are not covered by the tourist passes, nor are the long distance services.

For rail services see http://www.cp.pt/cp/displayPage.do?vgnextoid=87cbd5abe2a74010VgnVCM1000007b01a8c0RCRD&lang=en answers to schedule enquiries normally show the price.

For express bus services see http://www.rede-expressos.pt/ (only in Portuguese, schedules are under Horarios and again the answers usually show the price).

Might be an idea to see whether you can make your excursions by train or bus and see how much it would cost, it could be much cheaper than hiring a car although a few places may not be possible in a reasonable time.

Steve thats good advice to use public transport, just realised when hubby got lost around Lisbon the first time he drove there, he took a wrong turn and was riding round for 2 hrs to try and get out of the one way system, hes never had that problems since, and learned from his frustrating experience.

Arrived back 9/11/08 and another excellent 10 day hire from Travel rent. Our outward flight was delayed nearly 6 hrs, we arrived out of office hours but didnt get charged any extra maybe due to the fact that 3 other lots of people on the same flight had booked with them. Booked a basic car and got a 5 door Punto. We booked direct with travel rent this time and took the full insurance out with no excess, the cost being 100 euros for the duration, economycarhire quote was £125 so it was a good saving.