Recently we’ve had a number of weekends when both club vans have been in use and we’ve needed to hire vehicles. To cover these situations, WTMC has signed a contact with Thrifty Rentals to supply rental vehicles when both club vans are in use. In these situations, it is now club policy to use Thrifty Rentals whenever they have a suitable vehicle available (the transport officer will organise this for you). There are a number of advantages to having this arrangement in place. The first is low rates of hire. The second, and perhaps more significant, is that the contract with Thrifty is worded to allow the use of the club’s own insurance policy when hiring their vehicles. Our insurance is more comprehensive than the limited cover that comes with standard hire arrangements. For club trips, Thrifty will also deliver vehicles for pickup within a 10 km radius of the pick up location if necessary – in Wellington, the pick up location is 197 Wakefield Street in the city.
All bookings of vans for club use will continue to be made through the transport officer – please contact me if you do need a booking at . For the time being, when collecting a hire vehicle the person picking up the vehicle will still need to pay by credit card and be reimbursed by the club after the trip – but this will not be for much longer as we are in the process of setting up a charge back facility to be club. As per current club policy, we still ask that all drivers fill in a driver vetting form (PDF) and email it to me () before driving a club van or using a rental vehicle.
Thrifty will also offer any club member excellent rates for personal vehicle hire. To find out the rates call the thrifty reservation line on 0800 73 70 70 and quote account number 7298615132.
A reminder that all drivers should take care to drive to the conditions and make sure they take regular breaks and swap drivers regularly, particularly on longer trips. More information, in particular about driver fatigue and driving to the conditions can be found on ACCs website at http://www.acc.co.nz/preventing-injuries/on-the-road.
One last thing. The club needs two volunteers to clean the vans. This is a job which needs to be done every four to six weeks, the easiest way is to take the van to the BP car wash in Johnsonville (one of the few car washes big enough to take the vans). Ideally we would like two volunteers, one for each van, who can commit to doing this on a regular basis. Please get in touch with me by email () or catch me at club night.