Rugby World Cup Car Rental Fever

New Zealand Rental car companies have joined the multitude of Rugby World Cup hopefuls as the hype and anticipation of this global sporting event continues to rise.

With the RWC looming ever closer (9 September – 23 October 2011), rental car companies are pushing for customers to book cars and campervans early, touting the issue of lack of car availability due to the estimated 85,000 international visitors expected to arrive in New Zealand specifically for the event.

This is a good sign for Transfercar as many visitors are expected to travel around the country during this time with a number leaving their cars at major airport locations. These cars and campervans will need to be relocated back to their place of origin and we will be there ready to fulfill this need…..

For those interested, here’s the RWC schedule:

Auckland

09 September 2011 NZL – TGA
17 September 2011 AUS – IRE
24 September 2011 NZL – FRA
25 September 2011 FJI – SAM
01 October 2011 ENG – SCO
15 October 2011 WQ1 – WQ2
16 October 2011 WQ3 – WQ4
21 October 2011 LS1 – LS2
22 October 2011 WS1 – WS2

Christchurch

10 September 2011 ARG – ENG
11 September 2011 AUS – ITA
18 September 2011 ENG – EU1
25 September 2011 ARG – SCO
01 October 2011 AUS – EU2
08 October 2011 WPB –
09 October 2011 WPA – RUB

Car Rental Company Invests $25M in Tourism Growth

Apex Car Rentals, one of New Zealand’s largest rental car companies has recently announced a $25 million fleet expansion.

Part of the fleet growth for this season with include the addition of an extra 1200 cars. 700 of these will be new 2010 model Toyota Corollas and Toyota Previas. The new cars started arriving from 28 September.

Apex has had a stellar growth path over the last 20 years, growing from a solely Christchurch based company with six cars in 1992, to a nationwide company with over 4000 cars.

Read the full article at fourcorners.co.nz

Travellers embrace campervan relocation trips

An Australian campervan company has seen a 50% increase in requests for relocation deals after the credit crunch.campervan

This is especially noticeable as most relocations (or $1 a day) deals take place during peak summer season, Christmas and Easter.

Read the whole article at news.com.au

Email problems in the weekend

On Saturday our email sending service SMTP.com decided to disable our account. The reason was that someone had reported our emails as SPAM. The account was disabled immediately and without warning.

No emails from Transfercar last weekend
No emails from Transfercar last weekend

We didn’t see the email until Sunday after some of you called us about not receiving emails. And from there on it took another 18 hours before we were able to get hold of someone at SMTP.com and convinced them that we are not in the business of sending SPAM.

Transfercar practices a strict opt-in only policy and otherwise try to adhere to industry standards for good email ethics so we were very surprised that we were shut down without any prior warning.

Our web service Transfercar ( www.transfercar.co.nz ) is a facilitator between the parties of drivers and rental car operators, and two thirds of all our business is conducted by emails through smtp.com. We serve 60% of the rental car industry in New Zealand and many of them rely solely on emails generated and sent out from us.

The email list that generates the most emails (about 85% of emails are notifications of new listings in our database sent out to drivers) is probably the one that some poeple would report as spam. The reason for this is the nature of the list, generating a new email for every new car listed. That means that on some days subscribers will receive as many as 30 emails. We warn users about this but still we see many complaints about it to our support system.

We have gone through our email templates today and added more information in them on why the recipient is receiving the email together with unsubscribe links. We hope that this this will remove any claims of spam in the future.

Small updates to the site

I have made some updates to the site today. social-media-links

Mostly cosmetic changes here and there to make the site more usable. However on the front page there are some new stuff;

Will be back to make it all look a bit cleaner in the near future 🙂

On the road

My name is Brian and I am one of the founders of Transfercar. I have written this article series to help people who are thinking of relocating a car, camper van or motorhome for the first time via Transfercar.

This is the third and last article. The first part in this series explains what a relocation car is on what it means to be a relocation driver, and the second article explains how to find and book a relocation.

On the road

Day 1, our flight was scheduled to 6.40 am and we arrived Chrichchurch on time 8.00 am. On arrival we called the rental car company and they picked up us from the airport for free. It is a good idea to arrive early to get the most out of the first day.

crayfish shopThe relocation motorhome was ready to go, but first we had to sign a normal rental agreement (just as if you rented a vehicle under normal circumstances). Standard insurance was included in the relocation deal, but we still chose to upgrade the insurance to full cover. The additional insurance was $25 per day – no excess and a peace of mind but it is totally optional. Before getting on the road, the friendly staff of Jucy gave us a tour of the vehicle including how to operate the shower, kitchen and power.

Around 9 am we were on our way to Picton via Kaikura – approx 330 km. First stop was Kaikura to have fresh Crayfish at Nims’ Bin at State Highway 1. It was a fantastic day and absolutely gorgeous to sit on the beach in the middle of the winter.

Day 2,  we drove around the Marlborough Sound before crossing to Wellington at 2.30. The weather forecast predicted gustily wind, but luckily it turned out to be North Easterly with gave us a smooth crossing. In Wellington we stayed overnight at a public car park at Victoria Heights. We woke up in the middle of the night because we thought someone was trying to force their way in only to find out the next day that the rumble was an earthquake – 5.2 in magnitude. In a motorhome that feels shaky.our camper van

Day 3, we drove from Wellington to Napier over Greytown and Dannevirke. We found this little neat tea-house in the middle of nowhere serving high-tea in good old English fashion (sorry for those living in Greytown but it is in the middle of nowhere). We arrived Napier around 5 pm after about 5 hours driving from Wellington. Weather was beautiful the whole way and very mild 21 degrees.

Day 4, from Napier we took the inland route to Taupo, where we stayed overnight at a parking lot nearby the lake before returning to Auckland the next day. No earthquake this time but just a beautiful view over the lake. In New Zealand you are allowed to stay overnight at most public places (variation of rules may apply to different districts – see for instance camping policies for Tasman District), but the problem of course is that lack power supply and disposal of wastewater and rubbish. Therefore it is advisable to stay at a dedicated campground every now and then to put fresh water on the campervan and empty wastewater. You don’t get far with only 80L of water in the tank. Top 10 Holiday Parks are located throughout the country and they charge between $14-$22 per person per night including the campervan.

img_5299Day 5, we  returned at Auckland Airport at 3.30 pm. We had a great trip and spread out the driving equally on 4 days. One day normally goes with crossing the Cook Straight. Bear in mind that these campervans are not race cars. They can be difficult to get up to 100 km/h and it does take longer time to get from A to B than a standard vehicle. Normally we covered 70-80 km per hour depending on elevation and traffic.

For 5 fantastic days on the road our total expenses looks something like this for 2 people:

Jetstar

$90
Ferry for passengers

$100
Diesel 1,400 km

$160
Top 10 Holiday Park (optional)

$80
Additional insurance (optional)

$125
Total cost

$555

This is the third and last article in the article series about relocating with Transfercar. The first part in this series explains what a relocation car is on what it means to be a relocation driver, and the second article explains how to find and book a relocation.