car hire insurance in France - will I be ripped off?

[parakeet]

I'm trying to book a rental car from Toulon airport for a week. I decided to go with Hertz and got almost to the point of booking online when I noticed it did not seem to include third party insurance, and nor was there any option of adding this on. There was only something called Collision Waiver Damage, which seems to only cover the hire car itself.

I've looked around on the net and it sounds like it is common for the car hire company to try to sell you extra insurancewhen you collect the car, at an extortionate price because you have no choice at this point. Has anyone had this experience? Do you know a way to get round it?

Many thanks for any replies.

They do try to sell it when you collect the car. Have you gone through Ryaniar's website as they do give a small amount of discount if you use the link?

I have had a look at Toulon airports website and these companies also operate so may be worth getting a quote: Avis, Sixt, Europcar and National/Citer.

National are normally qwuite competitive. Europcar (IMO) are horrific!

I thought that if you book online with Hertz.co.uk the quote should include the minimum amount of insurance you need for the hire car. What I thought they then try and sell you when you pick up the car is the excess reduction insurance. The regular excess could be about 600 pounds (for example), and then you can pay the extra insurance to reduce the excess to something like 100 pounds (for example).

These articles on the telegraph website might be useful to you.

We have an annual policy for about £50. If you go on money supermarket there will be a link. It is easily cheaper than that rip off policy you will buy from herz.

Thanks for all this info, very helpful.