Thinking About Money

Most people who travel a lot know about the best cards for frequent flyer miles and features like baggage insurance. But for those who rent cars frequently or travel internationally, here’s one of the best kept “secrets” around. Most financial advisors will (rightly) suggest you avoid fee based cards. At $95/year, the Diners Club/Mastercard is one of the most expensive around. But for those who travel it can actually save you money. Here’s the trick:

Most cards today offer car rental coverage, but the coverage they offer is secondary – meaning that they pay after you’ve filed a claim with your insurance company. Diner’s club car rental coverage is primary – which means that they cover the collision damage without any claim on your auto insurance. That not only can simplify the claim process, it can protect you from a rate increase on your own policy.

From their web site:

For most Cardmembers there’s usually no need to file a claim with your own insurance company, so your personal insurance premium won’t be affected. For Cardmembers, the insurance covers physical damage and theft of the vehicle, reasonable loss of use charges, reasonable towing charges, and includes Secondary Personal Effects insurance.

As far as I know, it’s the only card that offers primary collision coverage.

In addition to a typical selection of benefits common among cards (like extended warranty, purchase protection, emergency services, reward program, miles on any airline, etc.), Diner’s club has another bonus for those who travel internationally – free access to an airport lounge in many international airports. If you’ve ever traveled internationally, you know that a few hours in an lounge (with it’s comfortable chairs, free snacks and drinks, computer workstations, etc.) can make a huge difference in comfort on a trip.

While this is certainly not a card for everyone, it’s unique features make it one that should be considered by every road warrior.

www.dinersclub.com

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 3rd, 2006 at 3:38 pm and is filed under Credit, For Professionals, Personal Finance. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.