What do I need to flexi hire a car?

Flexi hire has all sorts of fantastic benefits compared to normal daily or weekly vehicle hire, providing (as the name suggests) increased flexibility and freedom for you when hiring a vehicle that suits your requirements down to the ground. However, while the benefits are quite distinctive, the preparations you’ll need to make for actually hiring the vehicle stay broadly the same. Once you’ve chosen the car, van, truck or minibus you’d like for flexi hire, here’s a complete list of what it helps to have ready by the time you talk to one of our team. 

Documents

A full driving licence

You probably don’t need us to tell you this, but it bears saying anyway! The driver of the car or van will need to have a full, valid driving licence before we can hire out the vehicle - and this applies to all cars, vans and minibuses we offer here at Intack Self Drive. 

It’s worth noting that some of the bigger vehicles may have additional requirements, too. If you’re hiring a 17-seater minibus, for example, you’ll need to have either passed your driving test before January 1997, or have a D1 category on your licence. (Drivers who passed before Jan 1997 earned their D1 category automatically upon passing their standard test, whereas after this date it became a separate test.) A D1 category allows you to drive vehicles with no more than 16 passenger seats, and a maximum size of 8 metres. 

Proof of address

If you’re a new customer, you’ll need to bring two recent proofs of address with you; these will need to be dated, and no older than three months. If you’re a private customer, we’ll need your personal address, whereas if you’re a business customer obviously we’ll need your business address. Common examples of the documents we accept are bank or credit card statement, or a utility bill. 

On the other hand, if you’re a returning customer who hasn’t hired in over three months, you’ll similarly need to provide one new proof of address, one that’s dated within the past 3 months. If you’ve moved address or relocated to new business premises since you last hired, you’ll need to have two new proofs of address, dated within… you get the idea. 

DVLA code

If Intack Self Drive are providing your insurance for the duration of the rental, you’ll need a DVLA code. (It’s not required if you’re already covered by your own insurance.) You can get this code from this section of the DVLA website. This allows you to share key information about your licence with us, which we’ll need to see before we can hire out a vehicle to you. Using this, we’ll be able to review your driving record, any penalty points you’ve acquired, and whether or not you’ve recently been disqualified. 

It’s a handy tool that allows us to ensure that we’re hiring out vehicles to competent and careful drivers, and means that nobody gets tangled in the legal complications that would arise if we provided a vehicle to someone who’s been disqualified. For these reasons, this is standard practice for all modern vehicle hire companies. 

Once you get your code, it lasts for 21 days, so that’s how long you’ve got to get it to us. Note that it’s a one-use key, not an ongoing contract. It just briefly enables us to access your driving record so that we can ensure that all boxes are ticked. That means you don’t have to worry about renewing it like you’d renew the flexi hire contract itself; think of the 21 days as more of a deadline than an expiration date. Be sure to leave us enough time to use it, though - if you miss the deadline, you’ll have to get a new one.

Financial preparations

Security deposit

We’ll need a security deposit before we can release any of our flexi hire vehicles. This will be between £150 to £500 depending on the value of the vehicle, to be paid on a credit or debit card in the driver’s name. However, this can be reduced if you also purchase the loss damage waiver.

With flexi hire, all deposits will be banked. Banked deposits will be refunded when the vehicle is officially back with us. Bear in mind, though, that they can take up to three days to appear in your account. 

Age restrictions and other conditions

The age restrictions we have in place are fairly standard, so they’ll be no surprise to experienced fleet managers - but it’s still worth checking through them, just to be sure. As a baseline, all drivers will need to be over 25 years old, with at least 12 months of driving experience under their belts. Also:

• For large cars, drivers must be over 30 years of age
• For minibuses spanning from anywhere between 9 seaters and 12 seaters, drivers will have to be over 25 years old, with at least two years of driving experience
• For 17 seater minibuses, as we touched on above, in order to be eligible for hiring them drivers must have passed their test before 1997, or have the D1 category on their licence

Once you’ve got all that ready, you’re good to go! Feel free to take your pick from any of the cars, vans or minibuses for flexi hire that we offer here at Intack Self Drive. And of course, if you’ve got any other questions that haven’t been answered in this post, it’s worth heading over to our FAQs section, or alternatively just give us a call on 01254 57811, and we’ll be happy to help in any way we can.