Hiring a car in Sicily? get the best Sicilian car rental experience

Hire your car for Sicily in advance not in the airport. You will most likely get the best deal. Take a look at the google or another search engine to get discount codes for your online hire car booking. There are a lot of car hire companies in Palermo airport, but if you wait until you arrive you might not be able to shop around for the best Sicily car hire deal.

Make sure you take your card with you that you booked your hire car with. Make sure that the card you book with is in the name of the driver. My daughter booked her hire car in her name but her husband was going to drive and this caused all sorts of problems in Palermo airport.

Take out private insurance for hire car use. You are covered for a year and this will protect your deposit if you damage the car. We recommend Insurance 4 carhire.com. Their website also has lots of good general information about car hire on the Q&A section. An annual policy covering your car hire in Europe starts at £49.

Look at our list of Sicily car hire companies and see what sort of deal you can get.

Many car hire companies offer the following to you. Before paying extra for these it is worth checking your own car insurance to see if you are covered. An option I prefer is to take out additional yearly insurance that covers me for rental cars as mentioned above. The information below is explained more fully on this website.

1) CDW (Collision Damage Waiver), LDW (Loss Damage Waiver), PDW (Physical Damage Waiver). Charged as a daily amount, CDW or LDW waives the right for a rental car company to recover money from you if the hire car is damaged or stolen. Note that it does not cover third party damages. You can also void the CDW if you drive negligently or take the hire car off road for example.

2) Personal liability coverage such as LIS (Liability Insurance Supplement). Car rental companies may offer extra coverage which pays more than your personal car insurance covers.

3) PAI (Personal Accident Insurance or Coverage). This gives you or your passengers money if death or injury occurs as a result of an accident. Your travel, health or existing car insurance may already cover this.

4) PEC (Personal Effects Coverage) or Personal Property Insurance. Covers items stolen from the hire car. Again you may have these covered elsewhere.