On our last visit to Lanzarote we were unfortunate enough to “lose” the glass in the wing mirror on the driver’s side of the hire car.

Having brought the car back to the airport we were told that we would get a replacement car and that we should go to the garage, located underneath the main car park.  The office would let them know that we were coming.

And they did just that, because when we arrived in the garage they were expecting us.

We had to fill out a form with a description of the problem with the car, and after a short wait is replaced with a different one.  The replacement even turned out to be bigger!

The damaged car was driven off to be repaired before we even had a chance to get into the replacement one.

I can honestly say that the problem of the damaged mirror was taken very seriously, and they provided an excellent and customer-oriented service.

The prices must make visitors from the rest of Europe envious, with Super 95 Octane costing about 77 cents per litre on our last visit, compared to around €1.40 per litre in Germany!

Some petrol stations are not even self-service, so be prepared for a short wait and to pay the attendant at the pump.

That maybe OK for a day trip, but what about if you want to hire a car for the whole duration of your stay?

General advice (in Germany, at least) would be to book a car with a major hire company before you go, thus getting a better price and possibly even a discount if you happen to belong to an automobile club that has an arrangement with the car hire company, than you may get by just turning up at the airport and trying to hire a car there.

However, experience has shown that this advice may not always be correct.  In the days of the World Wide Web, is it possible to hire a car with a Lanzarote-based agency and get a better deal than you might do at home?

To find out, I tried to book a hire car from Arrecife Airport – a small class “B” one with air conditioning – for the last week in August, and was offered the following prices:

ADAC (German equivalent to the AA) offered me a 5-door Seat Ibiza for 185EUR including insurance, tax and unlimited mileage.

Sixt did not have Lanzarote or Arrecife in their list of hire-points for Spain.

Hertz offered me 5-door Opel Astra for 321EUR, or 260EUR if I paid immediately.

Expedia had a 4-door VW Polo (via EuropCar) for 209EUR in their system.

Then I turned to a local site – the German sounding AutoReisen.es who are specialised in car rental on the Canary Islands have a website in 4 languages.  Their offer, including tax, insurance, unlimited mileage, a child seat, an additional driver and no cancellation charge for a 5-door Fiat Punto was 132EUR!

So yes, it is possible to get a good deal by booking directly with island-based companies.  As with everything, you should compare with offers from companies in your own country, but I was unable to find a better deal for the dates and car type that I was looking for.

Just one question remains: what do you do with the unlimited mileage on an island this size?