Hawaii Rental Car Tips and Tricks - All You Need To Know

[BargainMan]

We just got back from POH on 12/4. Let me give you all that I learned on Rental Cars.

 

When you call 800 numbers of most big car rental companies they usually have no clear information on shuttles from the pier. Every major car rental company shuttle was there at every port we went to. The shuttles run every 30 minutes or less and you can also call them locally and they will send one for you anytime. Drivers are very friendly and a storehouse of information.

 

If you are in a hurry get on the first shuttle you see and then walk to your car rental company as most are located in the airport car rental zone.

 

I found Dollar to be the best deal as they do not require any credit card or advance payment to book a vehicle. You can then call and cancel if you are tired or change your mind at the last moment.

 

Most car rental shuttle drivers had a walk-in rate for people without reservations and this was in $25 to $30 range. We also got our rates reduced to the walk-in rate at Dollar as we had booked on online at a higher rate.

 

You can also book on Priceline and Hotwire if the rates are low enough. Check the total cost with all taxes and service fees before you buy. Once bought you cannot change or get refund here but the rates can be very low sometimes.

 

Dollar had a GPS navigator for $10 a day with a guide book with GPS codes. You enter the code number on GPS and it will voice guide you to the attraction. This is a great help and time and gas saver. So all of you who are afraid of getting lost or remembering unfamiliar road names, this is God send. Also no need to input difficult names.

 

Dont buy any insurance from car rental companies as most credit cards will cover rental damage and loss. They will pay full claim or your portion of deductible as they are the secondary insurers. Our experience with American Express has been good so far on a recent claim.

 

People were very friendly and went out of the way everywhere to help us.

Tours will show you more in less time. Self driving can be relaxed and flexible but you will miss many of the attractions that dont show up on guide books and maps. We prefer driving. Most ports had nearby free easy overnight parking.

 

If you need any more info feel free to ask and I will reply.

 

Mahalo From Sunny California

[runningradical]

Hi we will be sailing on the Pride of Aloha could you please tell me if there is free parking on the island of Kauai by the port. Thank you

[BargainMan]

In Kauii I saw many parking spaces around the ship and near the pier. We were out till late night and parked in a warehouse nearby. We left next day very early as we had to return the car and be back in ship by 1.00 pm. Parking should not be that big a problem for any port. In Kauii most people returned the car previous evening. You can ask the security at gate about parking and they should be able to guide you.

[piper28]

I found Dollar to be the best deal as they do not require any credit card or advance payment to book a vehicle.

 

Wow. If there was one tip I have about renting cars in Hawaii, it's avoid Dollar like the plague. We ended up with them on our last trip because the tour company we booked through used them. 3 island trip, and all three islands the one constant was that they just simply did not run enough shuttle busses. Every single other company would have two or three shuttles come by in the time that one would come by on Dollar, and as a result, the shuttles were completely packed (to the point at times that they couldn't fit everyone onboard). This wasn't just one location, which I could have written off as a bad apple, this happened on all three islands. On the last night we were there when waiting to get taken to the airport, I almost walked next door to Hertz to beg a ride from them since I'm a gold member there.

 

Maybe they've cleaned up their act since I was there (although your talk of shuttles every 30 minutes doesn't encourage me in that). However, after the experience of that trip, I'd rent from *anyone* else before I'd rent from them again. (And quite frankly, it annoyed me enough that I'm not likely to rent from Dollar anywhere else either).

 

For a while it was kinda a standing joke between my wife and I how many times we'd see another company's shuttle before we'd see the Dollar one. After a few times though the joke just wasn't funny. (To the best of what I could determine, it seemed that at each location Dollar was running exactly 1 shuttle bus, which every other company had a couple running. None of the times we were at the airport were what I'd consider off times to justify running a reduced staff.)

[BargainMan]

You can always take any other company shuttle and walk across to Dollar or any other rental company. We never had to wait more than 10 min for our Dollar shuttle. The main reason to select them was the security of booking with an option to cancel anytime without penalty or losing money. Also the rates I found were much cheaper than Hertz, Thrifty and Budget.

[JohnL1935]

I found the same problem with Alamo at one port. Seemed like every other bus was Budget so I finally just jumped on their bus. The driver did not ask for any paperwork so I continued on. I felt obligated to use Budget when I got there but the counter price was $10-15 higher than my Alamo reservation. I left and walked over to Alamo. On another occasion the shuttle driver did ask to see reservation papers. It isn't just Dollar that has slow or few buses.

 

John L.

[maddmaxx]

We rented cars at seveal ports during our POH cruise last week... one thing I noticed right off the bat... we were offered cheaper rates just by walking up to the rental car counter that we had gotten reserving a car on line. We had initially booked all of our cars, in advance and on line, with Thrifty. Thankfully they somehow screwed up our credit card information and kept rejecting our clean card.

 

When this happend at our first port (Hilo) I flagged down the shuttle driver for Hertz... he ferried us back to the boat, waited for us to pick up another credit card, ferried us back to the Hertz counter, and got us a great rate on a Mustang convertable... Bob, the Hertz driver, saved our day in Hilo and saved us a ton of money to boot.

 

We tried Thrifty at Port two, same story, they claimed our card was no good. (I called my credit union and determined the card was just fine and dandy and the problem was with Thrifty)... We went off to Budget and they were happy to put us in one of their Mustangs for 39 bucks... 20 less than not so Thrifty. Since I had one of their express check in cards we stuck with Budget for the rest of our rental endeavors and continued to get cars for an average of 20 to 25 bucks a pop less than what I had seen on web sites while planning the trip.

 

I suspect we may have been in town during a slow period and that's why we were getting deals on rental cars... but, we have never had a problem walking up to a rental car counter anywhere in Hawaii and getting the type of car we wanted... I do believe they were kind of scarce in Honolulu and was glad we had a reservation for our jeep... that was with Thrifty and it was the most we paid for a rental... we rented a Mustang convert. to kill the day before our red eye back to the mainland at the airport a week later and again, we got another decent rate. Thrifty can kiss me good by as a customer forever.

 

Overnight parking... Free in Maui at the pier near the boat... 10 bucks at Kaui at a business lot across the street from the boat...

[bobsydney]

Hi we will be sailing on the Pride of Aloha could you please tell me if there is free parking on the island of Kauai by the port. Thank you

 

There is very limited free parking near the port but there is a little shopping mall near the port that charges $10 for overnight security parking .... our rental car shuttle driver (Thrifty) recommended it and we found it very convenient and far easier than spending time searching for a free spot.

 

I have never had to give my credit card details in advance for car rentals with any company. For Hawaii, I booked my cars online through Hawaii Discount Car Rentals (using their corporate code gave me great discount rates ... I got cars for around $30/day and $50 or so for a convertible, whereas the rate through the rental companies themselves and the walk-in rates paid by other customers on the day were up to double that)) and I used Dollar and Thrifty in different ports. The reservation process worked like a charm ... the hawaiidiscountcarrentals website links you directly to the rental company reservation form and puts in the corporate code, you just then fill in the rest of the details ... name, address, etc and type of car you wanted, hit the reserve button and done.

 

Having made reservations, I joined Thrifty's and Dollar's free "VIP" programs to speed up the pick up process ... as well as my personal and drivers licence details, I also registered my credit card details with both companies so that I could simply hand over my card and licence at the counter and be out of the place with paperwork done and keys in hand in less than 1 minute. Thrifty even has a special line for its Blue Chip customers (at least in Kauai and major rental offices id did, but not in Kona where it shares a desk at the King Kam hotel with Dollar) so that I was in my car less than 2 minutes after I had walked off the shuttle.

 

As far as I am aware, there is no penalty for cancellations with any company, even where they have your credit card details. In fact, in Kona, we made a last minute decision (as we arrived) not to hire and I just walked over to the Dollar rental desk in the King Kam hotel and let them know ... they said "thanks for letting us know" ... end of story.

 

I don't think one company is better than the other ... their services are all essentially the same ... if one does soemthing differnt, they all end up copying anyway ... and yes, they all have good staff and bad staff who have good days and bad days.

 

Bob

[runningradical]

We are using Thrifty in Kauai and we were planning on teturning the car our second day in port, We were wondering how far is Thrifty from the port?

[Bob&Janet]

The Thrifty depot is in an industrial area about half-way between the port and airport ... less than 5 minutes drive. Thrifty run a shuttle bus to take you back to the ship.

[tpride3]

Thanks so much for all the good tips. We are going to be on POH, Dec17th. This trip was to good to pass up, but the draw back is Hawaii cost a lot of money to book a trip at every port. So renting a car is a great thing for our family. I was stressing about renting a car in advance afraid they would be sold out guess thats not the case. I'm I right?I guess all the car rental companies are close to each other? For a small car I guess $30-$40 is the going rate. So you can cancel if you find a tour and not be charged if you call them and let them know? Thanks for all the help

[bardenl]

We were also on the POH Dec. 4 sailing and rented cars from Thrifty except in Kona, where we used Dollar. I had gone to the Hawaii Discount Rentals website and got the discount codes and then called Thrifty and Dollar and made the reservations. In every case, I tried to reserve an Economy car. In Kona the minimum reservation allowed was for an intermediate. We were always upgraded. In Hilo we had a rag top Jeep, in Maui a PT Cruiser convertible, in Kauai a Dodge somewhat larger than the PT Cruiser, and in Honolulu, a Nissan Altima. The rates were excellent, significantly less than what I had tried to book online from Thrifty. One office mentioned that the code I had was for condo owners. Another nice feature was that there was no charge for the extra driver except in Kona from Dollar.

 

I had followed advice here on the boards and signed DH up for Thrifty's Blue Chip. Several times it saved time, others not. The offices were often busy and once a shuttle took a bit long. Glad we had advance reservations; twice no cars were available for walk ins. All in all, a great deal - thanks to all the tips here.

[bardenl]

BTW, Thrifty is often not near all of the other agencies. They were always close to the airport or dock, but I wouldn't assume you could walk from one to another.

 

The long drive on the Road to Hana all the way to the Seven Sacred Pools made me wonder if we should have taken a ship's excursion that day. Afterwards I saw that the ship's excursion rate for a 57 passenger bus was $100 per person!!

[dagtoking1]

"Most car rental shuttle drivers had a walk-in rate for people without reservations and this was in $25 to $30 range. We also got our rates reduced to the walk-in rate at Dollar as we had booked on online at a higher rate."

 

I noticed when we were waiting for our shuttle to Budget a shuttle from National pulled up and the driver was offering these insane rates, like 25.00 when our reservation was for a 40.00 car. We almost got in his van but our shuttle from Budget pulled up just then. I think it is a common practice to offer a walk-in rate but we didn't want to take a chance and confirmed the best price we could find. Great tip though, thanks!

[BargainMan]

The car rental people will adjust the rates to walk-in or the lowest rate if you ask. Also most websites guarantee lowest rates. You can still call and ask to adjust. There were plenty of cars in Dollar and Hertz during our trip from 11/27 to 12/4 on POH.

[DanL]

We have rented through Thrifty and are early risers. Our ship (POAM) docks at 8am at each port and I recall reading that the Thrifty shuttles arrive an hour after docking which would mean 9am. Is this correct or do they arrive earlier?

 

I also saw where you should call them. Is this necessary to get them there before 9am?

 

We want to take advantage of all the time in port we can. Thanks.

[mitsguy2001]

Which companies allow you to reserve a car without giving a credit card number, and allow last minute cancellations with no penalty? And, what hours are the open to pick up a car and to drop off a car? Whenever I try to do a mock booking, it always says they are closed at the time that I enter. Also, since I don't own a condo, does that mean I can't use the Hawaii Discount Rentals code?

[BargainMan]

I use Dollar and book for 24 hours. You can book without credit card and cancel if you cant make it. The dollar.com site was very easy but the 800 number people have no clue on cruise ports pickup. Every company has shuttles regularly running. Also do not forget to ask for a lower walk-in rate even if you have a booking online. You can get a car for $30 easily any time any port.