Geneva Car Hire French side??

A snowHead

Oh, right - must have missed that! Still, they are a lot easier to use, if not a reasonable substitute for winter tyres! I am driving to, through, and around the Alps in early April - have always had winter tyres in the past, and have new Michelin all-climate tyres now, but no chains that fit. I'm unlikely to have problems and am thinking about snow socks.

With car rental in Ferney Voltaire I think you just have to be prepared - make sure the provided snowsocks, or chains, fit before you leave the garage. Last few times I've checked there's been little difference in price between the Swiss and French sides, and it's only worth doing the latter for a big saving.

A snowHead

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

Thread reboot, but what's being currently being asked from Geneva are eye watering/kidney selling prices on the Swiss side-£700+ for anything, compared to £250 for the French side over Christmas week.
Am thinking either Lyon/Voltaire car hire and buy some snow socks in the UK to take over.

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Am thinking either Lyon/Voltaire car hire and buy some snow socks in the UK to take over.[/quote]

Friends have done that in the past and when they collected the car it was nothing like they had booked so snow socks didn’t fit and they ended up buying some locally.

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@andmelffion, Will try your suggestion with Budget direct...thanks.

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I bought snow socks from the Feu Vert in Ferney. Went to return them, after not using them, at the Feu Vert in Albertville (as the one in FV would've closed by the time we arrived). They wouldn't accept them as Feu Vert are franchise, so it has to be returned at the original place of purchase. However they also said the return of snow socks aren't permitted as it's a legal product. This was repeated at the Feu Vert in Annecy too. So we shoved them in the suitcase, now time to put them on eBay! rolling eyes

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After all it is free

In the end, got a 9 seater (travelling with another family) from the French side for £550, half the price of the Swiss side. Rental is with Alamo but phoned up the consolidator (Economy Rentals) who confirmed that the tyres are 'all season' which I am taking to mean winterized.
Reckon we'll drive out on the Swiss motorway (on another thread, it seems the chance of being checked for a vignette are pretty much zero) but will pay for one on return to use the motorway-all things considered, a small extra for a much simpler journey back.

@snowhound, My guess is that you won't get winterized tyres. If winter tyres are confirmed, I've always seen that plastered all over the booking page, both direct and through consolidators. I'd plan to be disappointed on that front.

Last week the French side was its usual chaos. I'd booked a 4x4 intermediate with snow tyres. Europcar insisted that the category I'd booked wasn't 4x4, even when I showed them the booking screenshot. "Yes, some of the cars in this category can be 4x4, but they aren't all, and we don't have any that are". At least I did get the snow tyres.

After a long discussion they agreed I could have a second driver for free instead.

Still, it was £270 (+40CHF for a vignette) for 8 days over half term, which was a pretty good price.

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@snowdave, Thanks, it is all cancellable I would add! I was told by @Davidof on another thread who seems to live locally that it is the law for the car to be winterized from the French side...but then he did caveat that by saying 'Zis is France' so it might not happen. I have emailed Alamo directly to ask and will wait for a reply; phone if necessary and then rethink if necessary.
We are going in a relatively quiet week I would add (16-23 Dec)....

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@snowhound, cars only needs chains at a minimum to legally drive in the French “winterised” zones. When are you going and to which location?

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@Ozboy, yep I know that so suspecting I'd get summers + chains in the boot, I did push specifically over the tyres and were told 'all season tyres'. Think I'm going to phone Alamo direct.
Les Menuires, week before Christmas.
Any doubt, I'll cancel and see how the Swiss side prices change over the coming months.

@snowhound, Thats a long time away and suspect prices will reset over the summer. I would personally go Swiss side as value the security of winters when driving in December. Take a look at the car rental booking service on the GVA airport where prices are cheaper than rentalcars.com and fully cancellable. I keep a close eye and often cancel and rebook if prices go down.

You know it makes sense.

@snowhound, if you are resolved to pay for Swiss vignette for the journey back to the airport, why take the risk - however small - of being fined for NOT having one on the way out? You could buy one at the border crossing in Ferney Voltaire - right outside the airport, before you go under the runway. Bardonnex is likely to be busier, to get one on the way back.

Like @Ozboy, I doubt that "winterised" means you'll get snow tyres. It means the car will conform to the French law. Will have chains, and if it's your lucky day, they'll be the right size.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

@Ozboy, @pam w, thanks both. Good call on the vignette, not thinking straight there. Didnt realise you could buy one on the way into Switzerland from the FV side.
Ozboy, thanks for the heads up about the booking service-will look and keep looking. Am seeing the FV booking as my fallback and will keep considering options, including private transfer if this is equivalent to a 9 seater hire from the Swiss side and conditions are looking dodgy.

A snowHead

So I know this is a "French side" thread, but I followed a link in one of the posts above so that's my justification Happy

Looking at the GVA site for car hire, a number of suppliers are asking for International Driving Permits in addition to the renter's National licence.

I guess it's relatively straightforward to get one at a Post Office or the like, but I was wondering if this has always been the case and was just never checked. I've hired in France, Portugal and Finland over the last couple of years and never noticed this before.

Thanks
CW snowHead

A snowHead

I've been following up the same thought, as I'm renting a car in Turin on Sunday. I've come to the conclusion my British driving licence will be OK. Hope I'm right. I rented a car in Geneva in October (Swiss side) and was certainly not asked for an IDP.

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@cardweg My understanding is that Brexit made it uncertain what the regulations would be for British drivers in two areas, post full withdrawal: the IDP and the Lichtenstein equivalent of the V5C. If you’re being asked to provide an IDP, or told by a car rental site that you may need one, then whatever the reality is in international law and local enforcement, I’d just get one anyway. Then you’re covered. As you say, it’s easy enough and just needs a visit to a PO that can issue one on the spot (only main POs have the ability to issue). You can do the usual internet forum circuitous speculation and you’ll get back a range of opinions, but it’ll be your problem on the day if you don’t have documentation demanded by an official.

In a similar vein, in theory if you drive a non-EU car into Lichtenstein you’re meant to have the international equivalent of a V5C, which can be obtained for free from the DVLA. I got one for our car last year as we thought we might transit Lichtenstein on our summer Alpine holiday. I was pretty sure it wasn’t going to be needed but I thought why not get one anyway? It was easy enough (there’s an application form on the DVLA website).

@snowhound You can buy a vignette online ahead of your trip e.g. from TollTickets. Many shops and garages in CH sell them, as do shops in France near the Swiss border, as well as at the actual border crossing. If you order online beware that many intermediaries charge a big fee on top of the CHF 40 for the vignette. TollTickets are the exception, but being EU-based, have a fairly long lead-time before delivery (7-14 working days). There’s no short-term option: the vignette is valid for 13 months (the designated year + Jan of the next year).

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There is a post office at GVA where you can purchase vignettes. Its on the right hand side, on the way to the hire car desks.

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

Although best to check first if the FR side car already has a vignette as you are travelling in 2023 and good chance someone has driven the car in CH this year.

After all it is free

@Ozboy, yep. I left one on mine as a public service. If anyone gets a grey Renault Captur from Europcar and benefits, feel free to raise a glass to me in the pub Happy

Tho' a friend did tell me to use vaseline on the windscreen so I could reuse it, and that you can also get them off with a hairdryer.

There was evidence that a previous renter had done precisely this...

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If you're only driving from Gva to one of the French ski stations, no point in getting a "doofer" - just use card. Between Gva and Chamonix there are only 2 toll stations, takes a couple of minutes at most.

As for IDPs, not necessary - this is authoritative guidance. https://www.gov.uk/driving-abroad/international-driving-permit

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@cardweg, I've never been asked for an IDP renting a car in Geneva at either the French or Swiss side, or the printout of your licence details from the DVLA.

There is no app for using the French autoroutes. You can get a transceiver (lots of posts here about that) but unless you are on your own it is not worth it. At the toll booth you pick up a ticket (I try and do it without actually stopping) then when you leave the peage you enter the ticket into the slot swipe your card over the card reader (no need to insert it) and away you go. It takes about 30 seconds at most.

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Hired a car last month Swiss side for once. All good except Europcar asked if I was going to take it into France. I asked why, she said there is a 50 franc surcharge for crossing the border. I said of course I was staying in Switzerland. Had a great uninsured weekend skiing in les gets just after the snowfall mid January

@risb98, you took a major risk. If anything had gone wrong in France (e.g some idiot driving into the back of you) you'd have been right in the merde.

You know it makes sense.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

I've looked at a few prices recently and found the French side no cheaper than the Swiss side. Where are people getting these cheap deals from?

A snowHead

@risb98, the "risk" is that you probably wouldn't be insured to drive in France if you didn't declare it. Were you really aware that you were likely driving without insurance? Confused

50CHF is a high cross-border fee compared to most of the other companies I think.

A snowHead

@pam w, i just compared both sides for the EOSB week using rental cars and auto-europe.co.uk. I also checked it on sixt website. No real difference, especially when you add the vignette, snow tires and faff.
My surprise came when I oscillated between flying to GVA and Lyon.
I would have thought Lyon would be cheaper, being French et al.

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Those are both really cheap, @johnE, I'm looking at 31 March for 8 days (for son, 5 of them so need reasonable size) and it's twice that. I agree the French side is fine, with cars in the terminal, rather than down the road, waiting for shuttle etc. And most of the time at the end of March winter tyres are not going to be a deal breaker.

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@pam w, I just had a look at my usual agent Argus car hire and big cars are twice that of economy ones. In this case it works out cheeper for a ford focus estate to rent from the Swiss side rather than the French side.

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It might be cheaper to rent two small cars than one bigger one!

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

After all it is free

I was asked about driving into France when I hired a Swiss car in October - and paid an additional fee, can't remember how much, but not a huge deal.

That was the first time I'd hired a car in Geneva for some years, but I don't remember being asked before.

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Geneva Car Hire French side??

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