Car hire excess protection? Recommendations?

[YetAnotherNewNameAgain]

Has anyone use it and would you recommend it? I suppose I'm nervous about taking it out and them not paying out, but the excess protection would be nearly £400…

Or do I need cover for more than just the excess?

”Excess Protection £ 18.00 / Day

Excess Protection (EP) is an optional coverage available only if Damage Waiver (DW) is included in the rate or purchased. EP reduces the applicable Damage Waiver excess amount. If EP is not included in the reservation, it is available for purchase.

For all cars and SUVs in the categories Mini, Economy, Compact and Standard, the excess can be reduced to 100 GBP. For all other vehicles, the excess can be reduced to 250 GBP. The excess will be charged every time a vehicle is damaged, lost or stolen.

Before purchasing EP, it is advisable to determine if the renter's personal coverage is adequate to cover damage, theft, loss of revenue, administration fees, diminishment of value and any towing, storage or impound fees. If EP is declined, the renter will be required to pay these charges up to the Damage Waiver excess amount and seek compensation through their carrier of personal coverage. Excess Protection (EP) is not insurance.”

You can usually get this done more cheaply by purchasing separately (just search for car hire excess insurance). This is usually a lot cheaper than adding it to your car hire and you can get it for single/multi trip etc.

Not purchased recently so can’t recommend a provider but we’ve always done it this way

We don’t always get it but luckily did the one time I scraped the car ( my first accident in nearly 30 years of driving). The car hire company looked at the paperwork, said “you are all covered” and we didn’t hear another thing. It was very easy. We had the car company’s cover. As said that is usually more expensive than buying independent cover but it did make things very easy.

We have excess hire car insurance from Eversure, last year's renewal was around £35, and we never take any additional insurance for hire cars. Of course, you can never tell how well it's going to work until you have to claim, and last year, we did! Hire car company in Lisbon mysteriously found damage to the driver's side alloy wheel,(yeah, right) which they only notified to us once we were safely on the flight home...

Anyway, made the claim through Eversure and got the full amount ripped off charged by Hertz €167, no excess to pay. On that basis, thoroughly recommended.

Edited to add that £35 is annual, multi trip Europe.

https://www.reducemyexcess.co.uk/excess-single.aspx
I’ve paid for a week’s excess hire for just over £23

If excess protection just covers the excess, why does it say this?

"Before purchasing EP, it is advisable to determine if the renter's personal coverage is adequate to cover damage, theft, loss of revenue, administration fees, diminishment of value and any towing, storage or impound fees. If EP is declined, the renter will be required to pay these charges up to the Damage Waiver excess amount and seek compensation through their carrier of personal coverage. Excess Protection (EP) is not insurance.”

Surely that's more than just the excess?