Taking premium car to Italy part, what restrictions ?

It's their car, they get to make the rules.

With all the electronics in cars these days ( standard or add on), you should assume they can track it.

If it was your car and you let someone else use it, but told them not to take it to someplace, and you found out they did exactly that, would you mind?

It's their car. You agree to their rules. Do you feel entitled to break the agreement you made?

Right is right and wrong is wrong. Why is this so hard for some people to get their head around?

Typical American tourist, trying to get around the rules? I know you may think it is unreasonable. It is their rule and they are not required to explain to you. And if the car has GPS, and I am sure it does, it is being tracked. It could also be a question of the car having the proper equipment on it or in it to be driven in Italy.

I understand, it is a agreement and should be followed, but I was trying to understand this restriction. Same way, as rental cars here in US, are not allowed to take on gravel roads, still we see lot of rental cars in Bodie ghost town, Grand Canyon west and many places. I am not against, following rules :-)

Then why are you asking if you're likely to be caught if you're not following the rules?

Thanks for helpful replies.

Well, I found information from other forum, we can get rental from Sixt, they will allow their premium car in Italy. Other way is, to rent from Avis, they 'can' amend agreement, from what I read.

with Europcar, it is no way around.

If you violate the rental agreement and have a problem (fender-bender, etc.), it is extremely likely that any insurance you think you have on the car will be void.

acraven, yes this makes sense. Thanks

Whenever you rent a car - whether from Sixt, Europcar or wherever - you always need to disclose which countries you plan to visit. There is an added surcharge depending on where you are going.

In Germany you do not require an IDP if you have a full valid US license.

As soon as you cross into Austria and Italy both countries require an IDP in conjunction with your license. To be clear since you seem to like evading the law, these are legal requirements of driving a car, nothing to do with the rental.

As soon as you enter Austria you are required by law - checked by both roving patrols and cameras - to both have and correctly affix to the windscreen in the authorized place an Austrian Vignette.

If driving in Italy, even just for a short time and not deep down in Italy, you had better be sure you understand the laws regarding Italian driving and ZTLs.

Before believing everything another (there are others besides us??? ;-) ) forum tells you it would be wise if you check with Sixt for the current situation. These things change from time to time, and sometimes even from one franchise to another within the same brand.

To get back to your original question, trying to understand the restriction, there are a couple tangible issues regarding Italy:

• Insurance exclusion: For whatever reason, many insurances exclude Italy from coverage, most notably nearly all plans offered as a benefit from Credit Cards, but other plans as well.
• Insurance Requirements: Italy does have some minimum Liability Insurance requirements, not typically offered as part of rental CDW, but as a separate policy.

So yes, it is mainly an insurance issue, but that insurance requirement is based on a risk someone calculated. Cars can certainly be stolen or vandalized anywhere, but the risk varies by location.

As for tracking, nearly all cars now have the capability to determine where a car was at through the cars electronic control module, not active tracking so to speak, however many cars now have optional tracking capabilities through a service that you can "look up" location or set alerts if a vehicle goes outside a certain range or geography. These are usually added pay features, unlikely a rental car company would opt for those, bbut you never know.

Thanks for clarification

Make sure that the car is fully insured, includig theft. The risk of theft is considerably higher in Italy (e.g. compared to Austria or Germany), especially when driving a luxury brand.

All modern cars in Europe have an emergency module, i.e. in case of an accident the car calls ambulance and police automatically, sending them your GPS coordinates. Depending on the readings of impact sensors the car decides whether you had an accident or not.

By the way, effective March 2018, all new cars within the European Union MUST have this emergency module.