Car Hire at UK Airports

[davidk65]

Never having had experience of car hire to and from airports I would welcome comments on the following.
I need to get a hire car from Southampton Cruise terminal, if possible I would like to collect the car at the the terminal. I am told that because I will be arriving at Southampton on a bank holiday Monday (AM) the only place I could collect a hire car would be from Southampton Airport. Is this true?
I will also need to return a hire car to Gatwick on a Sunday for a flight out in the afternoon. How easy is this to accomplish at Gatwick and how much extra time would I need to allow?

[spudqueen]

Have you actually researched this yourself david? Just wondering who told you about the bank holiday think? Have you actually rung any car hire companies? In just a couple of minutes on google I found that there are three cruise terminals in Southampton, none of them far from West Quay Road where there seem to be quite a few car hire companies. I'm sure that they will have experience of people from cruises wanting to hire cars.

[davidk65]

Yes I have had a go with 1or 2 companies in the area oft the cruise terminals the ones I contacted say they are closed on days like Sunday and all bank holidays. Just wondered if anyone had other experiences.

[Cakeboy]

I live in Southampton so can tell you the car hire places are near the cruise terminal, they're within walking distance if you don't mind a bit of a hike along a busy road.

If all the places are closed on a bank holiday, then you might well be stuck with getting a car from the airport which is a taxi ride away. I have no idea what it would cost you as I have never taken a taxi anywhere in Southampton, but it's about 10 miles.

As for returning a car to Gatwick, that isn't a problem, but you'll often pay a premium for hiring a car from one location and returning it to another one. WIthout knowing which company you're going to use I can't tell you how much extra time to allow as I don't know how far from the airport you'll be, although most of the big car rental companies have an office in the terminal, but it all depends on where you have to leave the car in the first place.