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What is Budget Truck Rental?
Moving can be a costly exercise, but luckily, they’re called Budget for a reason. Budget offers frequent discounts on moving van rentals, and a simple process with many locations across the US. Read our Independent Budget Truck Rental Review to find out if it’s the right choice for your move.
Pros: Budget Truck Rental is a great option if you’re—
- Looking for moving truck rental discounts
- Needing budget-friendly one-way transport
Cons: Budget Truck Rental is not ideal if you’re—
- Looking for a guaranteed reservation
- Need a specific truck size
Availability
Budget Truck Rental has over 1,700 locations in the US, with 30,000 trucks. Their strongest selling point is the affordability of their low base rates. These trucks are available for local and one-way home and office relocation.
Budget Truck Rental Options
The one snag with Budget is that they only have three types of vans available, namely:
- 12-foot trucks for 1-2 room (studio apartment) removals. The 12-foot trucks have a 3,100 lbs. Weight capacity and run on gas. These trucks don’t have any accessories.
- 16-foot trucks for 3-4 rooms (or a one-bedroom home) and have a 3,400 lbs. Weight capacity. Equipped with a loading ramp, these trucks run on gas.
- 26-foot trucks are suitable for 5-8 rooms (2-3 bedroom homes) and have a 12,000 lbs. weight capacity. Equipped with a loading ramp and towing bar, these trucks run on diesel.
Budget Truck Rental also offers Ford F-150 pickup trucks for smaller moves, landscaping projects and similar tasks.
Additional Budget Truck Rental Services
Budget offers a wide range of add-on features at affordable rates to make your move much easier. However, it is important to remember that the accessories are available on a first come, first served basis.
Depending on your requirements, you can include the following equipment in your truck rental:
Hand trucks – These L-shaped, two-wheeled hand trucks are helpful when it comes to move heavy appliances and stacks of boxes without damaging stairs.
Car carriers – These trailers are suitable for all-wheel-drive and four-wheel vehicles. Carriers have a maximum weight capacity of 4,055 pounds and a width of 6-feet 7-inches.
Tow dolly – Need to move your car without adding more mileage to your car? A car dolly will lift the front wheels of off the ground, and allow you to pull your car behind the rental truck. Car dollies are available with 16-foot and 24-foot trucks on one-way moves.
Furniture moving pads – Available in packs of twelve, these three by five foot quilted pads help prevent furniture from scuffing and allows you to wrap fragile items such as mirrors. You can add moving pads to any truck or van rental.
PlatePass – This saves time when you pass toll gates.
A note on car shipping: Although it’s easy to rent car dollies or trailers, it’s less easy to actually transport a vehicle. Your car is a valuable possession, and you should care for it as such. Unless you have recent experience in towing a car across a significant distance, you should rather look into hiring an auto shipping company. Even professional auto shipping carriers encounter poor drivers, difficult road conditions and adverse weather that can make moving a vehicle challenging. Don’t take any unnecessary risks.
Pricing
Budget Truck Rental offers affordable deals on trucks, and as per their sister company, Budget Car Rental, they have many locations and follow a simple rental process.
When you rent a truck from Budget Truck Rental, you will pay a $150 deposit. Truck rental costs are calculated as such:
- Daily rental cost (Sunday – Thursday has a lower daily rate than weekends)
- Mileage cost
- Taxes and fees
- Gas
- Liability coverage
- Add-ons.
Budget Truck Rental charges a package rate on one-way moves, whereby the estimated mileage is included in the overall cost. However, local moves are charged based on the exact mileage.
If you’re moving to a different state, you should opt for a one-way move. However, bear in mind that rental rates differ from state to state. That means that your cost may go up or down depending on the two states between which you are moving.
Budget offers a range of discounts on top of already affordable base rates, including 20% off all orders by:
- US Military personnel
- AARP members
- with local moves and 15% off one-way moves for EMT, fire and police members
- on local moves and 15% off one-way moves for Motor Club members
- with off local moves and 15% off one-way moves for Students
- 20% off local moves and 15% off one-way moves for Bar Association members
- 40% off one-way moves between select states.
Insurance Options
Budget Truck Rental offers three truck rental insurance packages, which may vary depending on the location. The plans include the following:
Complete Protection – Physical damage waiver, roadside assistance, supplemental liability and personal accident and cargo coverage.
Choice Protection – Physical damage waiver, roadside assistance, supplemental liability.
Value Protection – Physical damage waiver, roadside assistance.
Additionally, the company offers Auto Tow Protection which covers up to $15,000 of damage to any vehicle that is being damaged while it is towed by a Budget dolly or car carrier in the event of a collision, hail, fire or flood. This coverage can be added to any of the other protection plans.
What else you should know about Truck Rental from Budget
The one challenge is that the company cannot guarantee truck rental reservations. They don’t promise that you will receive the truck size you want at the location of your choice on the date and time you need it.
If your preferred truck size is not available, you will typically end up with a larger truck, but they will honor the quoted rate. This happens when other customers don’t return trucks in the best working condition at the right time.
What do customers say about Budget Truck Rental?
Budget is a franchise with many locations in different states. As a result, there may be inconsistencies in terms of service levels throughout the various locations.
Customers love how easy it is to book a truck through Budget Truck Rental. The four-step process involves picking your truck, finding a location, choosing add-ons, and providing your personal information.
Some customers would have preferred a bigger range of truck sizes.
Is Budget the best option for your move?
If you’re looking for an affordable rental moving truck, Budget Truck Rental is definitely the way to go. Their base rates are unbeatable, and they have fantastic availability across the nation as well as a variety of add-on services depending on location.
Also read:
Budget is great. I’ve used them more than once. I’m preparing for another move – long distance this time. Nationwide will move my car.
I prefer U-haul because of the storage and their wide coverage. Not saying Budget is bad because I havne’t used it. Just saying I like to stick with what works for me.
Budget called us last minute to cancel our booking and we had to scramble to find a new truck on short notice. Luckily Enterprise helped us.
I usually use U-Haul for but Budget had a deal on. Although I made a reservation, they told me they couldn’t confirm a truck would be available. The process took a bit of time when I went to pick up the truck as I had to do some paperwork for insurance. It was a lengthy process and quite stressful.
I prefer facilitating my own move rather than to rely on companies that handle professional moves. It gives me more control over how things are done. I always use Budget.
Since I first contacted Budget, they’ve been nothing but helpful. They went out of their way to provide they don’t typically offer. Can’t complain!
Hired a truck one-way from Budget. No hassles and great service. Booking was simple and efficient and there was no issue returning it at the destination. The truck was in good condition and ran well. Nationwide Auto Transportation transported my SUV and motorcycle. Also no hassles at all. Great service and friendly, professional representatives.
My family needed a Rental Truck. But just did not know its sucha lengthy process. Since its the summer. I suggest you make reservations and pick up dates ahead of schedule. My family dis NOT DO THIS. So as we contacted 8+ places. The companies COULD NOT G.J GUARANTEE they will be available. Well BUDGET WAS OUR WAY TO GO. Please BE CAUTIOUS. our DEPOSIT WAS 250$ ( not $150 as posted on website) BUDGET WILL RETURN YIU DEPOSIT IN 3 DAYS……BE CAREFUL
The worst rental company we have ever used. This was our tenth move and Budget’s service was terrible.
Yes we saved 20% on our rental but we would have paid full price for better service with pick up and return of the truck.
Rented 12 foot box van. Price was right. Drove from Florida to Pennsylvania through some heavy rain. Cabin leaked and wiper blades were terrible.
Beware!
We had reserved a truck months in advance from Budget for our daughters college move. The day before our move date, we received a call from Budget telling us that there were no trucks available at the location where we reserved the truck. We were told that the inventory manager in Colorado would assist us in securing a truck from another location close in proximity. We received a call from the inventory manager, who I found out later his name was Sergio, who rudely told us there are no trucks available. I was somewhat startled by his tone since there was not any prior discussions with him. I asked for his name, and he refused to provide it, when I pressed him more, Sergio hung up on me.
I called the location where we reserved the truck and he was very helpful (Evanston Il), he looked around and found a location not far that had numerous trucks available (location by ORD). While I am giving Budget a one star (Primarily due to Sergio, the Inventory Manager in Colorado) the managers in both locations were extremely helpful in assisting me to secure a truck.
I do not understand how Budget, a large truck rental facility, retains an individual like Sergio to interact with customers. I travel quite a bit. I will not rent trucks or cars from Budget moving forward. In addition, I am notifying my company of the situation as well.
This review leaves out the the very real possibility of not getting a truck, or just getting the tiny truck when you had reserved something substantially larger. In addition, Budget doesn’t care if they disappoint you, they hide behind legalese hidden in a link to their Terms and Conditions that state that your “reservation” is only a guarantee of your *rate* for a given truck on a given day. This leaves them with a flexibility to rent your truck to someone else if they pay more. “It wasn’t available, sorry!”
I had this experience Saturday, when I arrived to pick up my truck they informed me that there were none available even though they had 2 trucks of the size that I had reserved. Budget showed a psychopathic indifference to the distress and additional cost I would go on to incur for having to rent an additional truck from another moving truck company.
DO NOT COUNT ON BUDGET IF YOU HAVE TO MOVE ON A SPECIFIC DAY, THEY WILL DISAPPOINT YOU.
Horrible. Budget cancelled our 26’ truck 3 days prior to our move. No reason, customer service was rude. We were lucky to get a UHaul for the same day (their customer service is great, BTW). Stupid, stupid decision to use Budget to save a few bucks. Never again, and making everyone aware of it that I can.
Budget is horrible, the trucks are always breaking down, I got stuck in Florida, I live in va, for 5 days because they couldn’t find me another truck. Then they overcharged me, I have had 3 very bad experiences with them, and they did not do anything to make the experience better, they don’t care.
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Budget is by far the worst truck rental company you can use. Please Please do yourself a favor and use U-Haul or someone else. While it will cost a bit more up front the higher quality vehicle along with support provided will be well worth it. My issues with them are so many and so long this forum will not be able to handle it but in short. They did not have the truck the promised me, I had to drive dramatically further to get a similar truck to my reservation. The truck I finally got was ancient and in extremely poor repair. It did break down on my trip and that is when the real trouble began. I hesitate to call the group I worked with at Budget customer service. In the end my goods were damaged due to the breakdown, and I arrived three days late at my destination and budget was nothing but trouble every step of the way. I sincerely hope no one else ever has to experience the long list of issues I had with this awful company. For the rest of you who have already experience this disgraceful company no that I will continue to make my point. I just bought 100 shares of Avis/Budget stock and will make it may mission to let them know my opinion at every shareholder meeting and every chance I get.
Whatever you do, do not book a truck with Budget. Book literally anywhere else, the price difference is always worth it unless you are fine with getting cancelled on the day of your booking and being told you are SoL.
Budget will tell you that your booking with them is “not a contract” because they said so at the end of the page, and therefore they are free to cancel your booking whenever so long as someone else is willing to pay a higher rate, so sorry (not really), oh and maybe we’ll charge you the $75 cancellation fee even though we’re the ones who cancelled anyways just because that’s how Budget does business!
As an attorney, I can confidently say this is absolute bs. Your booking is a valid contract (otherwise they’d have no right to charge anyone a $75 cancellation fee ever), and depending on how last-minute they cancel on you the “contract” question doesn’t even matter (promissory estoppel). Good luck convincing anyone at Budget though, their customer service’s training is to pretend they care for long enough to get you off the phone and tell you to f*** yourself at the last minute if you keep persisting.
For anyone who has been similarly screwed over, I highly recommend considering filing a claim in your local small claims court for the difference between the price you expected to pay and what you actually paid due to Budget’s failure to live up to their end of the bargain, plus any additional costs you incurred as a result of the last-minute change in plans.