Car hire in Tenerifewith no excessThe deductible for each cover level, shown on the car before you book

Car hire in Tenerife with no excess is something you find on a particular car at a particular cover level, and each car shows it before you book. Open a car from the search results and its comparison of insurance policies lists the cover levels it offers, Minimum, Basic, Full and Full Plus, with a deductible row under them that reads an amount, “No franchise” or “Not available” for each level. The results list and the result card do not show the excess; it sits in the car's own view, opened from the result.

The excess is not the deposit. The deposit is held for the rental, and how it is held and when it is refunded are shown during booking and in the voucher. Some cars take no deposit at all, which is the search behind no deposit car hire at Tenerife North Airport, and the excess on those cars is read in the same comparison as on any other. Both numbers belong to the car, not to the island, so two cars side by side can differ on each.

The deductible is the most you pay towards damage to the car; above it, the insurance pays. An amount on the row is that ceiling at that level. “No franchise” means the car carries no excess at that level, and “Not available” means the car is not offered at that level at all. Each level is priced per car, so two cars can read differently at the same level, and one car reads differently from one level to the next.

The comparison is on every car wherever it is handed over, so a car collected after landing at Tenerife South for the drive north is compared the same way as one brought to a hotel: level by level, before you book. At both airports the handover is in the arrival area. Puerto de la Cruz has named points: Free parking Puerto de la Cruz, Parking Parque Taoro and the Bus Station Guaguas Puerto de la Cruz. Everywhere else the car is brought to the address you give, and whether delivery is included or priced is shown on each car.

The TF-436 into Masca and the climb to Teide are where the parts standard cover leaves out are most exposed. The TF-436 is the only road in and out of Masca, with narrow sections where even firefighting vehicles struggle to pass oncoming traffic. While a fire-risk alert is declared, access control on that road turns back vehicles driven by visitors for purely recreational purposes from 09:00 to 16:00, and it switches on and off with the risk, so check before setting off; bus line 355 runs to the village.

On the long climb to Teide, the TF-21 runs from the coast up to the cable car base at km 43, at 2,356 m, and there is no fuel station inside the national park, so the tank is filled before the climb. The wheels, the undercarriage, the windscreen and the interior are the parts a narrow mountain road is most likely to damage, which is why the deductible row is worth reading on the car you take up there.

It depends on the roads in the plan and on what the car's comparison shows. The standard level leaves out the wheels, the undercarriage, the windscreen and the interior wherever the car is driven, and the narrow roads to Masca, through Teno and across parts of Anaga are where those parts are most exposed.

So open the car and read the deductible row level by level. Where a level reads “No franchise”, that car has no excess at that level, and the price of the level is shown with it. Where every level reads an amount or “Not available”, that car offers no level without an excess, and another car in the same search may.

The questions below cover the excess on each car and what sits around it: where the deductible row is, how it differs from the deposit, what standard cover leaves out and what cancels the insurance. The rental conditions are set out in full on the terms page.