Van rental and truck hire in ireland : A Guide

Ireland has go quite specific laws relating to the use of trucks and vans, and to be honest they are not understood very well. Most people have what is required to drive a rental van or truck, specifically a drivers licence.

The standard Irish group B car licence entitles a driver to operate a vehicle up to 3500kgs GVW ( gross vehicle weight). This means that the van and payload cannot exceed 3500kgs in total.

The most common vehicle used in van hire fleets in Ireland is the Ford Transit. These come in a number of guises, typically ranging from 6 to 14 cubic metres in volume. The payload of a transit ranges from 800kgs to 1500kgs. The Ford Transit comes with space for 2 passengers and will always run on diesel. Another point to note is that rental vans in Ireland will always be diesel powered.

A standard car licence will also allow the rental customer to drive larger vehicles, typically vehicles like Mitsubishi Fuso unit and Isuzu Npr's , these are classed as light trucks, they offer the customer far more volume, typically around 22 cubic meters and also so companies will supply a tail-lift on the units. A tail lift enables heavy loads to be lifted from the ground  to be level with the back of the truck.

Insurance.

This can be one of the biggest problems of the private user of commercial vehicles in Ireland. Typically you need to have a comprehensive policy which your insurewr is happy to transfer onto a van or truck. However most insurance companyies are not too happy with this and will add a risk premium of between 30 and 70 euro for the transfer. Most hire companies can sell cover to the private user and typically a daily cost ranges between 20 to 40 euro per day. A downside of buying the cover from a hire company is the excess that van cover comes with, this can range between  1000 euro to 1600 euro. This excess is the maximun amount that the customer has to pay in the event of a crash or damage to a vehicle.

Rental companies

There are a large number of competent van hire companies in Ireland. Dublin in particualar has a large number of van hire companies. There are a large number concentrated around the airport. However the companies at the airport typically tend to have a smaller selection of vehicle types.