Author Archives: des

Piece by Peace – Tripcover’s Cultural Values

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At Tripcover we are replacing the following values in our culture.
We would like to change and grow “piece by peace”

1….instead of deadlines,  we use Milestones
      >more 

2….instead of rules, we use Guidelines
      >more 

3….instead of plans, we use Predictions
      >more

4….instead of expectations,  we use Explanations
      >more

5….instead of promises,  we use Agreements
      >more

6….instead of venting,  we use Responsible Complaints
      >more

7….instead of facts,  we use Stories
      >more

Six Ways To Save $$$ On Your Xmas Rental Car

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  1. Book Early: Firstly, save by booking your rental car two months ago, sorry 🙂 If you leave it any longer you will get really stuck, so book ASAP. At least you will know this for next holiday season.
  2. Use comparison sites: like VroomVroomVroom.com.au , http://www.discovery-carhire.com.au/ and www.Oodles.com.au and you are bound to get the best rates.
  3. Off Airport Rentals: Don’t get the rental at the airport as there are airport loading fees and generally the rates are more expensive.
  4. City Versus Suburbs: Check out  the rates suburb by suburb as you can sometimes get better deals outside the city centre locations.
  5. Standalone Car Rental Excess: Don’t take up the car rental companies’ offer to reduce your deductibles or excess liability, more commonly called CDW (collision Damage Waiver) This can nearly double your rental. Use standalone car rental excess reduction sites like tripcover.com.au . Their cover starts at around $9 per day and reduces down to around $5 per day over 15 days and covers ALL incidences including windscreens, single vehicle accidents, overhead damage etc. Use your AU or NZ Frequent Flyer number for a further 10%.
    tc8
  6. Discount Codes. Look out for discount codes like this one:  47684365   This will give you a 15% discount with Europcar, for example:

With Code:e1
Without code:
e2

TripAdvisor Review on Tripcover Customer Claim

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tripadvisorTripAdvisor Post from Barry R on Tripcover Claim  Process:


“I took out a nil excess policy with them for a seven day Hertz car hire. Hertz say I scratched their car which if I did was damage on damage, but then they hold all the cards.”

“Hertz froze $2,000 dollars on my credit card for 10 days till they decided the damage was $755. I claimed on line with Tripcover giving all the required documentation. With no other communication In a little over 10 days they credited direct to my bank account less a claim processing fee my $755.00”

“Tripcover worked for me, the only down side was carrying the $2,000 for ten days and then the $755 for another 10 days. I would use them again.”

Car Rental Companies Return Process

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From one of our customers “Amy”:

  • A quick email to advise that Eurocar has (rightly) come to a decision that I am not liable for the damage found in the car that was returned for servicing (and swapped for another vehicle) on 4th Oct .  They have agreed that due process in having the customer to sign off on the condition of the car, prior to leaving the station upon pick-up, had not been followed. 
  • Our Reply
    Good to hear Amy and it clarifies the check-out and claims process more for me now. It makes excellent sense for all car rental to try to stick to that simple process for all customers, ie if the customer signs off at the desk then they are clear and should NEVER hear from that company or car again. I have cc’d our accounts manager my reply and I think I will add your example onto the tripcover blog, without disclosing your name of course.Thanks again amy for the follow up info, and sorry that renting a car can sometimes be a pain.

Car Rental Excess Insurance About to be Radically Disrupted

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Tripcover International is about to radically disrupt the car rental market with their latest excess insurance policy.
Launching in 2012, the startup’s first policy was a derivative of a travel insurance policy but, like existing travel insurance plans, there was limitations on what was covered and what was not. Their latest policy release, underwritten by Allianz, now covers ALL excess fees for ANY car rental damage including single vehicle accidents (SVA), windscreens, tyres, lights, undercarriage & overhead damage.

Now car rental customers can rent a car from any car rental company in Australia and internationally and know that they are completely covered for all the excess component of their rental. – The “excess” is the first $3000 or so, that the customer is required to pay in the event of an accident. The car rental companies offer to reduce this excess at the rental desk but at around $25 to $35 which is almost as much as the customer is paying for the rental. Tripcover’s rates start from $9.30 and reduce as the number of rental days increase.

Tripcover was the first standalone car rental excess insurance site in Australia and use their Australian and New Zealand mobile sites, websites and apps to allow rental customers to bypass the car rental companies’ expensive rates and purchase the car rental excess, even as they are picking up their rental, which is pretty cool.

Tripcover Receives Startup Chile Grant to Expand Operations

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Startup Chile Grant 2013

A rental car excess insurance start-up and a downloadable keyboard replacement app for smartphones have been accepted into international accelerator program Start-up Chile.

The two Australian companies are part of the program’s eighth cohort of 85 start-ups that were selected from over 1,500 applications.

Tripcover chief executive Desmond Sherlock, who co-founded the business with brother Steve, told StartupSmart that they must have been selected because they’re disruptive.

“We are very unsexy, we’re just selling car rental excess cover,” Sherlock says.

“But we’re disrupting the industry. The car rental insurance companies are very unhappy with what we’re doing because we’re undercutting them by heaps, and they’re really annoyed about that.”

The funding will enable the Sherlocks to rapidly scale by launching an office in Chile to focus on the Latin American market and developing their API (code that integrates their offering within other businesses websites and offerings).

“We’ve been doing it for nearly two years, and we haven’t got any funding and we don’t do much marketing. But we’re selling 400 policies a month, and it’s doubling every two months so it’s starting to take off,” Sherlock says. “I haven’t been paying myself much and haven’t really been pushing, but now we’ve got a grant behind us we can start really going for it.”

Sherlock adds that their track record and previous start-up experiences have shaped their approach to their latest project.

“We’re approaching this as low key and practical, whereas before we had a start-up and we tried sexy, and built a bit of buzz and got a lot of funding, but it burned out,” he says.

Start-up Chile is a Chilean government initiative, with the 85 start-ups to receive access to mentoring networks, office space, a one-year visa to develop their project in the intensive accelerator process in Chile and US$40,000 of equity-free seed capital.

Tripcover’s Stand Up Pitch

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The day before the TravelTECH13 Startup Pitch Competition.

I Just knocked off another 25 practice pitches tonight and I think I am starting to nail it.
I have been practicing with 6 minutes but we can have up to 7 so I should go alright for time.

I hope I don’t slip up and say:

“Hi my name is des sherlock and this is Tripcover’s stand up pitch!”

Desmond Sherlock To Pitch at TravelTECH13

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ttechJPG

There’s a great program at Travel TECH and plenty of excellent speakers. Hope to see you there.

Des Sherlock has been in the online travel space for over 10 years which included co-founding the car rental comparison site Oodles.com with his brother Steve.

The experienced gained through previous ventures has been used to start their latest venture, Tripcover International.

Tripcover’s mission is to disrupt the near monopoly that the car rental giants such as Avis and Hertz have with selling rental excess insurance.

Using various distribution channels including web, smart phone and API’s. Tripcover is gaining traction in the market by scratching an itch that rental customers have had for years i.e. low cost excess insurance.

Des also enjoys philosophizing, so don’t get him started on relationships and dispute resolution or he may chew your ear off.

His personal blog is RethinkPerfect.com…more>

What One Person Thinks of the Car Rental Industry

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Confusion Reigns

Confusion Reigns

I was speaking with J. Bird on the phone the other day about excess cover and the car rental companies generally and he came up with this quote that I agreed with and hopefully, with a bit of help from Allianz Global Assistance Australia we can overcome it.

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“If someone had set out to design a business system that would piss people off they could not have done a better job than what the car rental companies have come up with”
J. Bird

Time for a change I reckon. I have been working in this business of car rental excess insurance (deductible or CDW) for two years now and am still trying to get my head around what the car rental companies cover and don’t cover as part of their $3300.

For example Thrifty Australia have an excess of $3300 but on top of that they have
a single vehicle accident (SVA) of $2200 if you take a rental from their non-metro depots. So does that mean that their excess is $5500 and not $3300 in this case??

Thrifty SVA

There are some 6 major car rental companies (on Australian airports) and each one have idiosyncratic clauses in their rental agreements and terms & conditions that totally leave their customers flabbergasted and confused. (granted, Redspot/Sixt seems to be cleaning up its act)

More Confusion with AVIS T&Cs
I once spent an hour emailing back and forth with the AVIS help desk, which was very prompt, I must say, but all I wanted to know was if a windscreen would be included in their $3300 excess for their standard liability. After 4 exchanges I was not really any clearer and to tell the truth I still could not tell you for sure if our excess insurance covers windscreen damage with AVIS.

[Des]
I am doing some research on what liability I have if I rent a car from Avis.
If i do not take out any additional cover for a small car what does your standard liability cover? ie are Windscreens, tyres and lights covered and what about single vehicle accidents?

[AVIS]
All our vehicles regardless of size come with automatic insurance – Loss Damage Waiver.  Upon payment of the agreed excess which is usually $2650 plus taxes, you are covered for all damage to the vehicle as well as third party property, provided you have acted in accordance with the terms of rental.  (copy attached)Things which are not covered are listed in section 8.3 as follows :

8.3 Additional amounts payable: In addition to Clause 8.2, You must always pay to Avis the following costs and fees:
(a) the cost of repairing any:(i) Overhead Damage or Underbody Damage;
(ii) water damage to the Vehicle;
(iii) damage to the Vehicle or to the property of any third party caused
by a breach of clause 3, 4.1 or 5;
(iv) damage to a tyre or an Accessory not attributable to normal wear and tear; and
(v) damage to the Vehicle or to the property of any third party caused deliberately or recklessly by You, any other driver of the Vehicle or any passenger carried during the Rental Period;
(b) the cost of replacing, if lost or stolen, an Accessory; and
(c) if You have breached the Rental Agreement, a per day loss of revenue
fee based on the actual and estimated downtime of the Vehicle.

[Des]
Hello again. Can I confirm that Overhead and Underbody damage means Windscreens and wheels and tyres etc?

[AVIS]
Please refer to the attached under the heading :

INTERPRETING YOUR RENTAL AGREEMENT
Overhead Damage’ means damage to the Vehicle or property of any third
party caused by the Vehicle coming into contact with anything above the top of the door seal and the top of the front and back windscreens; and

Underbody Damage’ means damage to the Vehicle caused by the Vehicle coming into contact with anything below the bottom of the door seal and the bottom of the front and rear bumper bars.

[Des]
Thanks again P for the info but I am sorry to be a pain but can you just tell me if the windscreen would be covered as part of your standard liability?

[AVIS]
The windscreen is covered provided you pay the agreed excess. So for example, if your agreed excess is $2650 and the new windscreen costs $165, you only pay $165.

My Conclusion
I think it is time for a change, time to help rental customers in Australia and New Zealand to get their head around their liability when hiring a car. I am hoping, with a little help from Allianz, Tripcover’s underwriter and Allianz Global Assistance, who we come under management from, we can come up with a NoButs plan that will take the confusion and uncertainty out of the car rental industry or at least reduce it.

Who said that Car Rental Excess Insurance can’t be sexy?