US hire car tolls

[SussexBantam]

Hi

I’m planning a long road trip in the US in the summer during which I will hire a car in Washington DC which I will reutrn in Orlando. Along the way we will drive through Virginia, North Carolina and Georgia.

Any advice on what to do about tolls ? Will the hire car company in DC have a pass which works in all these states ? Is there a cheaper way to organise this ?

Thanks for any thoughts.

[toddy]

It will depend on the hire company (check their website for specific details).

I’ve just got back from Florida and it was very straight forward with Hertz. $5.95 charge for every day I used a toll road plus the cost of the tolls.

[ChrisC]

And each state may very well require their own transponder to charge you automatically.

Don’t just assume that a DC transponder will work even in neighbouring VA let alone NC and FL.

[ChasP]

car hire companies can charge whatever they please as administrative fees on top of the actual charges

Batter idea is get your own
if you were travelling the other way get a Visitors toll pass or if you are likely to be going again
https://www.sunpass.com/en/home/index.shtml
\You can pick up a transponder for $5 in Target

EZEPASS can be bought in Virginia (not sure about pre trip) and should get you all the way – works in 19 states
https://www.ezpassva.com/ but I’ve never used them

• This reply was modified 54 years, 4 months ago by .

[ChasP]

toddy wrote:

It will depend on the hire company (check their website for specific details).

I’ve just got back from Florida and it was very straight forward with Hertz. $5.95 charge for every day I used a toll road plus the cost of the tolls.

I’m just back from Florida and got a Visitor Toll Pass – (sadly only available from Orlando MCO at the moment ) saved me $100

[toddy]

ChasP wrote:

toddy wrote:

It will depend on the hire company (check their website for specific details).

I’ve just got back from Florida and it was very straight forward with Hertz. $5.95 charge for every day I used a toll road plus the cost of the tolls.

I’m just back from Florida and got a Visitor Toll Pass – (sadly only available from Orlando MCO at the moment ) saved me $100

ChasP wrote:

toddy wrote:

It will depend on the hire company (check their website for specific details).

I’ve just got back from Florida and it was very straight forward with Hertz. $5.95 charge for every day I used a toll road plus the cost of the tolls.

I’m just back from Florida and got a Visitor Toll Pass – (sadly only available from Orlando MCO at the moment ) saved me $100

I did read about those but we actually only drove on toll roads on 2 days, so the fee was only $12.
Less than the $18 I’ve just been charged by the Hard Rock hotel for 2 bottles of water in the room (naively I presumed these were complimentary…)

[davefl]

The answer is that it’s very dependent on the hire company, the states you’re travelling through and your exact route. I’ve just driven 2800 miles from Austin to Phoenix via NM, AZ and CA and didn’t encounter a single toll road.

Plan your route on Google Maps before you go and you may find you can either minimize your use of tolls or avaoid them completely. Also remember that some but not all still have cash payment options. In 15000+ miles of driving in the US over the past 12 years I’ve never had to use a rental car transponder. (although these days in some states there’s no option but to use some kind of device)

The best two articles for your research can be found here:

https://yourmileagemayvary.net/2021/12/16/learn-what-you-may-have-to-pay-for-toll-roads-before-renting-a-car/

https://yourmileagemayvary.net/2021/12/01/are-toll-apps-worth-it/

[SussexBantam]

Thanks everyone !

[StaggerLee]

We are just back from a 2 week Texas road trip. Budget offered us all tolls for $11.99 a day. I said no, the guy did say that Texas had a lot of toll roads but didn’t try the hard sell.

They do indeed have a lot of toll roads but we navigated away from them all and didn’t pay a penny. Generally the routes we took were rarely much longer than the toll roads and the driving was much nicer and more interesting than ploughing down busy interstates the whole time.

If you are using Google Maps to navigate just remember to select Avoid Toll Roads in the settings and you’ll be fine.

As a slight aside, the roads around Austin and their airport are a bloody nightmare.

[davefl]

StaggerLee wrote:

We are just back from a 2 week Texas road trip. Budget offered us all tolls for $11.99 a day. I said no, the guy did say that Texas had a lot of toll roads but didn’t try the hard sell.

They do indeed have a lot of toll roads but we navigated away from them all and didn’t pay a penny. Generally the routes we took were rarely much longer than the toll roads and the driving was much nicer and more interesting than ploughing down busy interstates the whole time.

If you are using Google Maps to navigate just remember to select Avoid Toll Roads in the settings and you’ll be fine.

As a slight aside, the roads around Austin and their airport are a bloody nightmare.

Exactly my earlier point 🙂 Much nicer, rarely much time difference. It tends to be toll bridges that you cant avoid without a massive detour but I dont think there are any in Texas. Golden Gate is an example that has a one way toll but you can pay on the web for that.

I avoided the airport crazyness by doing Lyft in and out and also avoided the $55/day parking at the hotel.

Its such a variation from state to state. Pretty much can’t get out of O’Hare without paying a toll, and if you’re coming out of MCO then the new tourist tag is a really great idea.

[StaggerLee]

davefl wrote:

I avoided the airport crazyness by doing Lyft in and out and also avoided the $55/day parking at the hotel.

We did that in Austin but had to drop the car at the Airport. We got a hire rate from Expedia that was over half the price of the next cheapest deal but we couldn’t get it to without dropping at the airport.

Unfortunately our drive there was delayed for a couple of reasons which meant we arrived there about 5.30 on a Friday afternoon. Not exactly the best time to try and get to such a busy airport. Still, we managed it with only two near death experiences, which wasn’t too bad 🙂

[Mel TS]

StaggerLee wrote:

davefl wrote:

I avoided the airport crazyness by doing Lyft in and out and also avoided the $55/day parking at the hotel.

We did that in Austin but had to drop the car at the Airport. We got a hire rate from Expedia that was over half the price of the next cheapest deal but we couldn’t get it to without dropping at the airport.

Unfortunately our drive there was delayed for a couple of reasons which meant we arrived there about 5.30 on a Friday afternoon. Not exactly the best time to try and get to such a busy airport. Still, we managed it with only two near death experiences, which wasn’t too bad 🙂

This thread fills me with hope that a) we can avoid the toll roads ( it looked that way from the maps but good to hear experiences) and b) that it is possible to avoid too many near death experiences around Austin and the airport 😂

[kevinb]

Great tip @ChasP. Going to MCO later this month and was getting worried about all the new non-cash toll roads that are appearing. Visitor Toll Pass looks like the way to go. Thanks.

[Jamjaw]

Just back from Orlando – Hired from Hertz and on way from aiport took advantage of the toll plate system – $6 for every day it is used and charges tolls. Much easier than buying anything else. Every other day I avoided tolls without issue, including return to airport, was about 5 minutes longer according to Google but worth it to save $11.

[davefl]

Jamjaw wrote:

Just back from Orlando – Hired from Hertz and on way from aiport took advantage of the toll plate system – $6 for every day it is used and charges tolls. Much easier than buying anything else. Every other day I avoided tolls without issue, including return to airport, was about 5 minutes longer according to Google but worth it to save $11.[/quote.

Sorry but that’s a terrible mistake from MCO.

If anyone is headed there this summer please look at this free alternative to the rental rip off.

https://visitortollpass.com/

[Jamjaw]

I agree it is not the cheapest, but it is the easiest – calling it a “terrible” mistake may be a bit much really – it cost be $6 but meant I did not need to find the tollpass machine in the airport or provide card details to another entity.

[davefl]

Jamjaw wrote:

I agree it is not the cheapest, but it is the easiest – calling it a “terrible” mistake may be a bit much really – it cost be $6 but meant I did not need to find the tollpass machine in the airport or provide card details to another entity.

It’s not just $6, it’s $6 per day that you incurr a toll and a the highest toll rate for each occasion. Utter ripoff with Hertz.

The tollpass gets you the max discount on the tolls and it’s free.

Agree it’s convenience but convenience costs money.

[dougzz99]

davefl wrote:

Jamjaw wrote:

I agree it is not the cheapest, but it is the easiest – calling it a “terrible” mistake may be a bit much really – it cost be $6 but meant I did not need to find the tollpass machine in the airport or provide card details to another entity.

It’s not just $6, it’s $6 per day that you incurr a toll and a the highest toll rate for each occasion. Utter ripoff with Hertz.

The tollpass gets you the max discount on the tolls and it’s free.

Agree it’s convenience but convenience costs money.

Lot of good info here so people can choose for themselves. Given the current rental rates and petrol (gas) prices for me I’m not going to sweat a $6 + toll daily fee. It does seem from my experience and others they do now only charge this fee on the day you use the tolls, if they charged it for every rental day I’d have a rethink.
In terms of gas prices in California in April the cheapest (does anyone put high octane in a rental?) was between $5.2 and $6.2/gallon, with the typical around $6.

• This reply was modified 54 years, 4 months ago by .

[davefl]

dougzz99 wrote:

davefl wrote:

Jamjaw wrote:

I agree it is not the cheapest, but it is the easiest – calling it a “terrible” mistake may be a bit much really – it cost be $6 but meant I did not need to find the tollpass machine in the airport or provide card details to another entity.

It’s not just $6, it’s $6 per day that you incurr a toll and a the highest toll rate for each occasion. Utter ripoff with Hertz.

The tollpass gets you the max discount on the tolls and it’s free.

Agree it’s convenience but convenience costs money.

Lot of good info here so people can choose for themselves. Given the current rental rates and petrol (gas) prices for me I’m not going to sweat a $6 + toll daily fee. It does seem from my experience and others they do now only charge this fee on the day you use the tolls, if they charged it for every rental day I’d have a rethink.
In terms of gas prices in California in April the cheapest (does anyone put high octane in a rental?) was between $5.2 and $6.2/gallon, with the typical around $6.

It’s the principle of the matter. They charge you the highest fee for each toll, pay the lowest discounted rate and pocket the difference.

CA has come down as has everywhere else, stations out in the sticks were over $10 in March, with city prices well over $7

[dougzz99]

@davefl. I get it, but it’s a very individual thing, and principal is fine when I’m not on holiday. Company uses all methods to extract max cash from customer, that’s not really different to the entire business model of any company. If I’m getting on the subject of principal, in the USA there’s a whole raft of things ahead of milking some toll fees.