Renting a car in Mexico - What about the rules and cops

[Mike]

If the rental car company forces you to purchase insurance it's a scam in itself. From my understanding every rental car in Mexico comes with the legal amount of liability insurance. If you are comfortable with this amount, quite often credit cards cover the collision/theft/etc. Just print any information regarding existing car rental insurance from travelers insurance policy or credit card and bring it for proof - read the fine print on the rental agreement. Stick to international companies (which are more affordable through hotwire.com) and don't let anyone twist your arm into purchasing an unneeded additional policy. They will try to frighten you, but if you know the rules, eventually they will soften and giggle when they realize you are too clever to be caught by their scam. Book your car before you arrive and bring the confirmation. Check all features for function before leaving the parking lot.

You should really look into the details of this. It's not as simple, cut and dry as it seems you might believe. You have very limited coverage from your CC company and even less from a US based insurance company. Make sure you contact both before assuming you have any coverage whatsoever, but even if you find you have some, I guarantee you don't have it all - there are a whole litinay of issues, such as lost income to cover to the rental car if it's wrecked, covering damages in cash before you are allowed to leave and of course the big one of covering lost wages if you injure a Mexican.

 

[mattmexico]

yo

The speed signs at the highway are sure tricky as they "fluctuate" widely from 100 to 80 to 60 and no one pay's any attention. One of the things I do if I am not sure is to go with the flow or a little slower as the rest of the participants. In general on the highway from Cancun to Tulum you can go 100. If you are within Playa the center line is 60 and the outer line is 40 as all towns. If you look at the speed limit at time it says SALIDA below the number. Here the speed limit is only for the departing / exiting traffic.

Gas stations might not only be closed on Sundays but they might run out of gasoline too. Pemex has the monopol, yes. Gasoline price is the same on all gas stations. The only difference is in Quintana Roo we have a tax rate of 11% and the rest of the country has 16% and with it different gas prices. Another scam you can't do nothing about is the discrepancy of gasoline pumped in quantity and what is actually coming out of the pump nozzle. Quite a few pumps in Mexico are "fixed". You can see that when you say take a 50 lieter tank and fill it up to 50 lieters and there is some gasoline "missing".

Cops can be on motorcycles too, yes. In particular in Playa or Cancun they can stop you too. On the highway they have no juristiction, only the Federales have. The Municipio or Transito cops within towns or villages take you drivers license or similar to get you to pay at the police station .. who might be in the middle of nowhere or closed on Sundays. If you go and pay within a week you get a 50% discount as long as you are not overly speeding.

The Federales don't take your divers license or similar but give you a ticket. You go online, print out a receipt with case number and go to the bank and pay with the case number. Here you get a 50% discount as well when paying within a week.

greetz
Matt

 

[TSandM]

Interesting information, Matt. I know, the one time we got pulled over when I was in the car, it was in Playa on the desviacion, in a monsoon. The police officer told us he was going to take our license to the station, so I told him I'd follow him there to pay the fine. He told us we couldn't follow him, because he wasn't going there. I told him he'd just SAID he was going there to give them our license. Eventually, he got tired of arguing with the Spanish-speaking tourist lady and standing in the rain, and let us go . . .

 

[Reef Tank]

Interesting information, Matt. I know, the one time we got pulled over when I was in the car, it was in Playa on the desviacion, in a monsoon. The police officer told us he was going to take our license to the station, so I told him I'd follow him there to pay the fine. He told us we couldn't follow him, because he wasn't going there. I told him he'd just SAID he was going there to give them our license. Eventually, he got tired of arguing with the Spanish-speaking tourist lady and standing in the rain, and let us go . . .

Almost exactly the same thing happened to us in Cancun.

 

[kathydee]

You should really look into the details of this. It's not as simple, cut and dry as it seems you might believe. You have very limited coverage from your CC company and even less from a US based insurance company. Make sure you contact both before assuming you have any coverage whatsoever, but even if you find you have some, I guarantee you don't have it all - there are a whole litinay of issues, such as lost income to cover to the rental car if it's wrecked, covering damages in cash before you are allowed to leave and of course the big one of covering lost wages if you injure a Mexican.

Humm lost wages for a local, thanks - will have to look into that one. Have contacted all insurances and read the fine print the rest seems to be covered through my various insurance policies: travelers, credit card, personal auto & medical and the liability insurance which comes with the car.

 

[PlayaCountryBoy]

Great info Matt! Well done! I don't get pulled over often and I do drive here everyday, but I will say that when I do get pulled over, I am one that doesn't want to go pay the ticket. So I usually have a little beer money tucked under my license when I hand it to them...I get back my license and a smile and off I go...problem resovled!

 

[stdiver]

Thank you. This is great info.