Liability Insurance when renting a car?

Third party insurance, that is insurance against injury to other people outside the car, or damage to other vehicles or property is a legal requirement for all motor vehicles in all countries in Europe. You will have this automatically included in the price.

Insurance against damaging the vehicle you hire is an optional extra, called CDW. If you have another source of insurance for this, you could decline the CDW, but they may want proof or a hefty credit card deposit. Such insurance is not normally provided by credit card companies in Europe. I don't know where you are from so I cannot comment on whether you have this

Insurance for injuries to yourself, to other passengers or theft from the vehicle is optional and is your responsibility

Hi Wendy. Liability insurance is provided by default by the car rental company at no extra charge to you; no need for you to do anything or pay extra. As far as collision insurance using your credit card, you will find differing opinions, but for me it has worked well. Check the fine print on your credit card info before you go. Enjoy your trip!

I personally would not want to rely on credit card insurance other than the optional A Express policy that is quite good. But run of mill credit card insurance is marginal at best. Do a search here to turn up some of the past problems.

1) Third party liability insurance is a legal requirement is already covered. Not sure why you would need additional liability insurance.
2) What is not a legal requirement is the cost of any damage to the hire car itself, you need to cover that one way or another, or accept a very large bill if you damage the car.
3) Coverage for your own injuries or theft from the car is the third category

Wendy, I am not sure which of these three you mean by "collision insurance".

@Tom, we haven't yet established where Wendy comes from, so we have no idea if her car insurance covers rented cars. This is definitely not the norm in any country in Europe I have come across. Normal car insurance in Europe only covers cars you own, and Credit Cards never give car insurance.

Thank you all for your responses. We are from the United States, and our credit cards do cover adequate collision insurance.

Having worked in casualty insurance for 37 years, it is my opinion that the bodily injury liability insurance is the most important coverage, and the property damage liability insurance the next (think hitting a Lamborghini or building). Collision coverage is the least important for one's financial health, and yet that is only what everyone worries about. Collision damage issues to the car are unlikely to break you financially, whereas injury to others, serious injury to others, when you don't have sufficient coverage can affect the rest of one's financial life. If there is a capped dollar amount for liability insurance in Europe; for example, $50,000.00, then you need more, unless you own nothing and have no money in the bank and never plan to have any, or if you have millions in the bank you can self-insure, otherwise review what you need. Contact your insurance agent and discuss this with a knowledgeable agent. And pay attention to your personal umbrella policy, because if you have less liability insurance than the policy requires, the difference is out of your pocket. We did deal with accidents in different countries, so the logic that they won't come after you is not necessarily true. But more importantly, if you caused serious injury to another person, wouldn't you want to compensate them for their loss and change in life as a result? Call your insurance company and speak to someone who knows what you need.

Under EU law, you must have third party insurance (what you call liability insurance) of at least €1,220,000 (£1,200,000). You will have this automatically as part of your car hire.
See here: https://broker.aviva.co.uk/news/article/469/changes-to-the-compulsory-insurance-minimum-limit-for-third-party-property-damage/
So I don't think a "top-up" to $200,000 is needed.

I bring this up because there may be no instance in Europe where medical costs would be born by auto liability insurance

Correct Tom, third party insurance covers costs (medical and other) for people outside your car (in a car you hit, or to a pedestrian). It does not cover medical costs for yourself or passengers in the car you are driving. Medical cost for EU residents in the UK are covered by the NHS, and in other countries by their respective national schemes. As a non-EU tourist, you need medical insurance for all eventualities.

FYI the largest ever insurance claim in the UK resulting from a car crash was £22 million. And it was paid by the insurance company. The driver managed to cause two trains to crash: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/north_yorkshire/3170834.stm

I am saying the car insurance covers liability costs (compensation, loss of earnings, disabliity) for people outside your car (the third parties). Hospital costs would be covered by the NHS. I am not sure what would happen if you hit a non-EU tourist who was not covered by the NHS. Possibly the third party insurance would cover that.

The article I posted about the Great Heck crash says "has settled 47 of the claims arising from the accident with another 47 still remaining.". Those would all have been train passengers and crew.

Thre are EU reciprocal arrangements, so any EU/EEA resident is covered for medical costs in any other EU country (click here for info). It is just non-EU tourists who require medical insurance.

Tom: Bodily injury coverage and 3rd party property damage liability coverage are separate in Massachusetts, and other New England states I've worked with. I'm surprised your state combines them as they are different animals, so to speak, but each state handles their auto insurance slightly differently. Better safe than sorry in my book...as I've seen how hard it is to defend the people that didn't have the appropriate dollar amount of coverage.

Perhaps in all of the EU and every other country, you can't sue for fault for an accident and pain and suffering, but isn't it just the luck to be at fault for an accident with the nationality that can? Not worth the risk from my experience. I don't skimp on insurance in my travels...but then I have a risk management mentality as well. ;)

Thank you all for your replies. We have spoken with the car rental company, and as some of you noted - they include liability in the rental.