Car Hire Essex - Home Page

Essex is a county in the East of England. The county town is Chelmsford, and the highest point of the county is Chrishall Common near the village of Langley, close to the Hertfordshire border, which reaches 482 feet (147 metres).

The name Essex derives from the East Seaxe or East Saxons. The Kingdom of Essex was traditionally founded by Aescwine in 527 AD, occupying territory to the north of the River Thames, incorporating much of what would later become Middlesex and Hertfordshire, though its territory was later restricted to lands east of the River Lee. It is through this origin as one of the 'Saxon' kingdoms that Essex is specifically not part of the region known as East Anglia (the latter comprising Norfolk, Suffolk, and Cambridgeshire), settled by tribes calling themselves 'Anglian'. Colchester in the north east of the county is Britain's oldest recorded town, dating back to before the Roman conquest, when it was known as Camulodunon, and was sufficiently well-developed to have its own mint.

Essex County Council was formed in 1889. However, the County Borough of West Ham, and from 1915 the County Borough of East Ham, formed part of the county but were not under county council control. Southend-on-Sea also formed a county borough from 1914 to 1974. The boundary with Greater London was established in 1965 when the former area of the East Ham and West Ham county boroughs and of the Barking, Chingford, Dagenham, Hornchurch, Ilford, Leyton, Romford, Walthamstow and Wanstead and Woodford districts was transferred to form the London boroughs of Barking, Havering, Newham, Redbridge, and Waltham Forest; an area similar to that known as Metropolitan Essex.

Essex became part of the East of England Government Office Region in 1994 and was statistically counted as part of that region from 1999, having previously been part of the South East England region. In 1998 the districts of Southend-on-Sea and Thurrock separated from the shire county of Essex becoming unitary districts.

Car rental

Car rental, rent-a-car or car hire agency is a company that rents automobiles for short periods of time (ranging from a few hours to a few weeks) for a fee. It is an elaborate form of a rental shop, organized in numerous local branches, primarily located near airports or busy city areas and often complemented by a website allowing online reservations. There are also third party websites (such as online travel agencies) which compare quotes from the major car rental agencies.

Car rental agencies primarily serve people who have a car that is temporarily out of reach or out of service, for example travellers who are out of town or owners of damaged or destroyed vehicles who are awaiting repair or insurance compensation. Because of the variety of sizes of their vehicles, car rental agencies may also serve the self-moving industry needs, by renting vans or trucks.

Car rentals are subject to many conditions which vary from one brand to another. The vehicle must be returned in a good condition and must not exceed a maximum driven distance, otherwise extra fees may be incurred. Additionally, some companies set a minimum age for the vehicle driver, which in some cases is as high as 25, even in countries where the minimum legal age to hold a driver's license is much lower. Recent conditions have utilised GPS technology to limit maximum speeds or driving to specific regions. Renewable fuel vehicles are available in certain areas.

The vast majority of car rental companies require the use of a Credit card to make it easier for them to trace a person after they have stolen a car, or to charge additional fees at will if a defect is later found with the car.

There are two major types of Car Rental Companies. The first group of companies own their own cars (known as a fleet) and may have agreements with car manufacturers to provide all the cars for that fleet. An example of this type of company would be Alamo or Europcar.

The other type of car hire company operate on a broker model and have commercial agreements with Car Rental Companies to provide access to their fleets of cars.