2009 Summer Car Rental Shortages Drive Holidaymakers to Book Early for 2010

Dec. 11, 2009 - PRLog -- Summer 2009 was a frustrating time for many holidaymakers who left booking a rental car until the last minute. Due to the poor economic conditions in Portugal, Spain and other popular tourist destinations, there were widespread shortages of rental cars. This resulted in prices increasing dramatically in the summer months, with customers paying 2 or 3 times the normal rates. In some cases there were simply no hire cars available.

Matt May from http://www.carhirefaroairport.com who provide car hire at Faro Airport Portugal explains "we had a lot of problems with people who left booking their rental cars until the last minute. In some cases we were able to get cars, but the prices were much higher than for those people who booked a few months in advance."

"The reason was simply that the local rental companies did not have the volume of cars available, and were having to pay high prices to acquire cars at the last minute. In some cases particularly for the larger groups of car such as people carriers and minibuses there were simply no vehicles available. The poor English summer weather exacerpated the situation with a lot of last minute holidaymakers heading for the sun".

There is likely to be a similar problem in 2010, maybe not to the extent of 2009 as many of the rental companies will have been prepared to speculate a little more and increase the sizes of their hire fleets.

Rute Oliveira from http://www.malagacarhirespain.com continues "we recommend that people book as early as possible. The rental prices are not going to go down by leaving booking until the last minute, and many companies including ourselves do not charge anything in advance. Last summer hiring a low cost rental car at Faro Airport in Portugal was very difficult if you hadn't booked before July. Prices were around double by the start of the school holidays, and in August in many cases it was not possible to book a car at all. This autumn we are seeing an increasing number of people booking early to avoid the summer chaos of 2009"

So if you have booked a holiday in Southern Europe this year consider booking your rental car as early as possible, it may make a significant cost reduction for your holiday.

Blue Valley Car Hire are a UK based car rental company offering care hire at both Faro and Malaga Airport. For more information or to book a car please visit the website http://www.bluevalleycarhire.com

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Blue Valley Car Hire are a UK company offering an internet booking service for low cost car rental at a number of locations in Southern Europe including Spain and Portugal.