With car hire shortages anticipated from 19th December for the Christmas and New Year holiday period 2009/2010, easyCar are warning their customers to book car hire NOW to avoid disappointment. 

The demand for rental cars has been historically high in the UK and Ireland during the Christmas season, but shortages are expected this winter in the popular cities and resorts of France, Portugal and Spain too.

easyCar reported in June 2009 that many areas of the UK, France and Spain had actually run out of hire cars during Easter, with the credit crunch leading car hire fleet operators to use their current stock of cars for longer periods, and not replace all of the older vehicles. A number of sources throughout the summer also stated that holidaymakers were more likely to book the small cars as they presumed they were cheaper, although this wasn’t always the case, which then led to the smaller cars being in very short supply.

Again the message regarding Christmas car hire availability with the shortage of cars and increasing prices being a problem, is that if you want to be sure that you will get the hire car of your choice, do not leave your rental booking until the last minute – BOOK NOW!

This summer has seen cars in short supply, and today the BBC news  website has highlighted this issue with news that many villa holiday customers have opted to cancel their travel plans rather than pay up to 100% more for their car hire compared to last year (according to travelsupermarket.com).

Good advice here is to always book early if you have booked your flight and accommodation seperately. It’s surprising the number of people who will book a flight and a villa in January, and then leave thier car hire booking to a few weeks (or even days!) before they travel.  In years gone by, at worst this may have meant not getting the hire car of choice. This year it has meant many people have had to pay more than before or even seeing no car hire available at all.

In European resorts, easyCar has increasingly better availability as the summer high season progresses, particularly if you are travelling from late August onwards. However, supply will still be tighter than in normal years, and the later you leave it the higher the price will be – so book early!

There’s still a voucher code offer available from easyCar to help you save on car hire, just visit the car hire discount page and use the code on the screen!

This week, another car hire company, carrentals.co.uk , has reinforced the message easyCar has been talking about for several months now – the summer of 2009 will see far fewer cars available for the car rental market. Separately, an article in the Irish Times this week has also warned about the same issue facing the car hire market – where in Ireland, the car hire industry has seen a 70% drop in new vehicles this summer.

The fleet shortage this summer is in part due to the credit crunch causing a shortage of finance available to car hire fleet operators. As a result of this, car hire companies are less able to raise capital to fund new hire cars. In some cases this may mean older vehicles being kept on for an extra season, however hire cars have a finite usage period, and many will be retired from service and not replaced with newer vehicles.

The industry had a first taste of this during Easter, when in the week running up to this April holiday, large parts of the UK, France and Spain ran out of hire cars. The message is clear – if you want to be sure you will get the hire car of your choice, do not leave it to the last minute - BOOK EARLY!