Linden Hotels
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One more roadblock
Entry 3 of 23 | show all | print this entry |
We finally came to the conclusion that we need to rent a car, and better to do it early. Continental has proudly touted their relationship with Avis and Budget, and promised a discount if they transfer our phone call.
First we got prices on-line from both companies, and a few other including local Israeli companies. It seemed that for what we wanted (two weeks + unlimited kilometers) we'd have to shell out around $600.
Not too bad.
We settled on a mid-sized sedan, big enough to fit all four (my parents would rent another car), but not too big since Israel has the third highest gas prices in the world.
We called up Continental, gave our frequent flyer number and promptly got transferred to Avis. The lady on the other side was nice, but as informative as I was - from what she was saying I had the feeling that she was reading the information off the website - the same information I was looking it.
After she quoted me the prices (same as on the website, about $550 for two weeks) I asked about my Continental discount.
She didn't know we got transferred from the airline, but I guess they have some sort of way to tell, because she could verify it.
She recalculated ... no discount!
Not discount - no deal.
We called Continental again, and this time asked to be transferred to Budget.
Same procedure here, talking to a lady who for all practicality was reading the information off the website.
However the price was about ¼ of either the Israeli companies or Avis.
Then we asked for the Continental discount.
We got the discount - we made the deal.
Total was $172.23 ($145.73 + $26.00 in fees) for two weeks for a midsize class C car (Hyundai Getz 1.3 or similar) with unlimited kilometers.
Continental saved us about $10 (pretty cool). We asked for child seats, but they charge you $5 per day, per seat - that's $130 extra.
No thanks, we'll either bring our own, or borrow from the family in Israel.
Overall this was a successful venture. It took some pre-planning, research and about an hour on the phone, but we saved (or rather "didn't spend") $400.
Now let's just hope there are no "surprise charges" waiting.
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