Hey Roadies,
Am an Indian citizen currently in India. My US Driver's license expired 2015.
Earlier, many of the US rental car firms (as also Auto Insurance) had reservations against International Licence holders. Any ideas on how to find which ones and what restrictions (while I am still out of US)?
Also, will deeply appreciate any ideas to find the cheapest rental vehicles, both one way and return.
Regards
An International Drivers License does nothing more than provide a translation of your actual drivers license. If you your license is already in English, then it really is not needed at all in the US.
I'm not sure what problems you've had (or maybe have just heard rumors about?) with rental car companies, but considering that foreign visitors are a huge part of the customer base of rental car companies, I'd be very surprised if you have any difficulty at all obtaining a rental car with an India license. If there is any issue in regards to an International Drivers License, it may be that they want to see the original government issued license rather than the IDL.
Many companies do have a "country of residence" option when making a reservation, and often being from outside of the US can help you get a better rate. UK/European based consolidators can, at times, also have better deals available for foreign visitors, especially in regards to one way rentals. Of course if you still have concerns about your license, the only way you're really going to know the specific policy of the rental car company, is to contact the company directly and/or look at their rental policies which are typically posted online.
Thanks Midwest Michael,
My views on getting higher rentals from foreigners from 15 years ago was not hearsay, but from personal experience. I don't know if they have better rates for foreigners from Europe/UK or the like, but India certainly wasn't in that list. In fact, if I remember it right, rental companies with lower prices (Dollar was one) have refused to rent me the cars based on my International licence.
Thanks for your inputs all the same
As I mentioned, most major companies have an option where you can select "country of residence" before you even start the reservation process. I just looked at Dollar's website, and they have that menu, and India is one of the options. It looks like you may have to rent from an airport location, but that's pretty common on one-way rentals anyway.
One-way rentals MUST either start or end at an airport location for everyone, not just foreigners.