Let me be clear about two things. 1) We have never had a Yellow Fever vaccine, ever. And 2) I don’t like lying, at all… but the stakes were pretty high. If we missed our flight the rest of the ticket would have been cancelled.
So let me back up and explain what happened.
We’re late to the airport as usual. Actually, I consider it early if we show up to the gate and have to wait instead of boarding right away. And we’re certainly notorious for not “researching” ahead of time. Visas, reciprocity fees, onward tickets, and now vaccines… they’ve all surprised us at boarding at some point.
Try not to judge too much though. This is our life, hopping from country to country. I don’t check what vaccines I need after going to Mexico and didn’t think to check when leaving Colombia. Which in this case, is exactly what happened. The other piece of back story is that Colombia is a Yellow Fever endemic country, and Costa Rica apparently cares about that.
Checking in?
The checkin lady first scared me by asking, “did you make changes to your ticket?” after giving a funny face. Then she “uno momento-ed” me and ran off to an office across the way. When she came back she seemed to have solved whatever problem that was until another problem came up. This probably warranted someone who knows english. Well… some english.
He asked, “do you have your yellow fever?”
“Well, no… No I don’t have yellow fever.”
That was easy.
But eventually I realized that he was asking about the Vaccine, which got a blank stare. He then explained that one needs to have the yellow fever vaccine to board this flight. So he asked again, except this time I said yes. Which… I know, it’s a lie.
But if I had missed this flight, I would have had no way of getting out of the country to Costa Rica and then to Guatemala, which is also where I catch my flight home. It would have been a disaster and think about it… all my hotels were on PointBreaks, so whatever hotel we would have gotten wouldn’t have been as good of a deal.
Worse case scenario went through my mind and the obvious solution was to say that we did have the vaccine.
However, apparently they and the other flight attendants need more than scouts honor, they needed proof.
The solution to providing proof was a lady in a back room who had a stack of the papers that would ordinarily provide proof. I’m not quite sure who called her but she showed up and took care of the situation, in a seemingly black market kind of way. She was willing to sell us these cards and properly fill them out for $70 each.
Not too sure what other details I needed to give here. We got the paper, got our boarding passes, ran to our flight… More like, ran right onto our flight – last to board.
“How do I get myself into these situations?” There was the time we got stuck in no man’s land between the Cambodian and Vietnam border and so many other examples. “Oh wait. Because we didn’t properly plan”.
Landing in Costa Rica
We were staying at the IC in San Jose (which is really west of San Jose) and I emailed the hotel about getting a car pick up. Clearly labeled on the website, even still, it says an airport pick up is $30.
But when the hotel emailed back, they said a oneway would be $49 plus a 7% fee for charging to the room. Total would be $52.43, which is not $30. What the heck? Plus that was their standard taxi car and they had fancy upsells.
I clearly declined as this was clearly a rip off. (Yet, when I showed up to the airport, I had a driver waiting. *shakes head*)
The pick-up price had caused me to check online and car rentals were super cheap. I went with Thrifty for $8 a day.
Now this is the biggest bologna I’ve ever seen. Estimated mandatory charges are here and then it says grand total $35.
This is bologna. When we got to the airport they told us that we could not decline insurance per Costa Rica law. See normally the Chase Sapphire Preferred, Ink Bold and United Explorer card have primary insurance if you decline the car rental insurance. But they would not let us. We were forced to buy it and it brought the price of the car rental from $35 for 4 days, to $125 for 4 days.
Yes, in the fine print of the terms and conditions it tells you that you have to buy insurance and it gives you the amount. I asked why this wasn’t included in the quoted price online and the answer was, “because we have many insurance options.”
The real answer is that you’re more likely to buy if you see $35 than $125. Plus, then they can upsell me to the most expensive insurance.
And by the way, I hate car rentals. So often they are slimey.
- They tried really hard to upsell us on better insurance and tell us how dangerous it is.
- Tried to rent us a GPS for $10/day and when I said I didn’t need one, she told me that in Costa Rica there are no road signs and none of the roads are labelled. Which is not true!
- Instead of giving me a full tank of gas they told me to bring it back at the same level.
This is evil genius crap right here. See no one can accurately guestimate at the pump how much you need to put in to be exactly on the line where you received it. You will go over. If you go over, they just made gas on you.
If you go under or forget to return, they charge you a ton of money for the refill but don’t actually refill it! In other words, if I get it at 3/4 of a tank and return at 1/2, they will charge me like $40 to refill back to 3/4 of a tank. However, they will just tell the next guy who rents the car to return it at 1/2.
Scam all the way around.
Of the last few times I’ve rented a car, this hidden crap is a theme. In Austria they had a “winter tire fee”, which took me a minute because I heard “vinta via vee”. Which, why not just have that cost included in the displayed price when you search? Geez, you don’t charge me a cleaning fee, an employee at the counter fee, the purchasing the car fee and what not. These are expenses and they make up a price.
The time before that we rented a car with me mum in England, at LHR to be exact. The car rental place was at the Sheraton and the car wasn’t ready for 2.5 hours. So we waited from noon until 3pm by the time we actually left. And when returning the car days later, we returned the car later than we planned, but they charged us for an extra day “because the form said we’d return at noon”. I wrote them point out how insane this is given that we waited forever and returned the car equally late as they had given us the car. My time should start when I get the car not when I wanted the car.
Anyways, it was an odd and kind of stressful day. Plus, we road around without any insurance, (well…the minimum required liability insurance), which is stressful. Makes me want to never rent a car again, unless it’s a safari.
Also, the first could be called a bribe, or a black market purchase, or what? I don’t know. But what do you call the second? There’s a word for when you are forced into an unforeseen purchase… Anyone?
Ha ha! BOTH of these events happened to me earlier this year. On a trip back from Peru, with a stop in Costa Rica, I too got the “where’s your yellow fever card?”
I got it sorted out because I actually had the vaccine and my insurance company posts the records on-line (thank you, technology!) but I could have been screwed like you. You were very lucky to pay only $70—they offered me the option of taking a vaccine again and waiting a week or so….Good thing I found my proof online.
Happens so, so often that the gate agent just chuckled when I boarded. You’d think the airlines would warn people about that.
Also, in C.R., we were hit with the extra insurance. Frustrating, but we knew it would happen to us so we paid. What’s worse, Hertz Gold means sh*t down there.
One advice is to pay for tire replacement insurance at teh counter. CR is a well-known area for slash and rob thieves. We got our tires punctured but were lucky enough not to get robbed. (We drove on the flat until we got to a guarded area.)
Well that makes me feel a little less dumb about the entire thing. Although at least you actually had it! I paid for the shots I never got. lol
Bummer about the tire. Good thing we had an older car. 😀 Good thing I used Thrifty.
Yeah renting cars is such a scam – I have a whole blog post coming about that but just haven’t written it down because it’s SO scammy 🙂
I can only imagine it’s way worse in other countries
I swear it’s more the off-brand companies more than the countries. But in this case… I guess it was more country related it.
One more thing….I know you felt ripped off but, if you had read up on the places beforehand, you would have seen it coming.
Oh, I don’t disagree with either. :-p
“When we got to the airport they told us that we could not decline insurance per Costa Rica law. See normally the Chase Sapphire Preferred, Ink Bold and United Explorer card have primary insurance if you decline the car rental insurance. But they would not let us.”
You can still decline CDW (which is what I believe most credit cards require), the insurance that Costa Rica requires is SLI or supplemental liability insurance.
Well, the SLI still cost us $100 extra. :-/
I got hit with that same insurance scam. Pisses you off doesn’t it? When I got back to the states I called Thrifty corporate to complain, saying that I got coverage through my credit card. They said in order for that to work, you have to show them the terms and conditions of your CC showing that it covers you. I have a feeling though, if I did that It wouldnt have made any difference. Its one thing for an american agent to say one thing on the phone, but when you are in a foreign country, whatever the CSRs there say, go.
As much crap as regulations get in the states, things like that make me grateful to live in a country with regulations (which are all things considered, pretty well enforced).
There was no budging her. She’s just doing her job, and probably doesn’t know that rule anyways. But the company, that’s what makes me mad, is the lack of transparency. But not just thrifty, all of them take this opportunity. And in a sense they have to. If I go to Expedia, why in the world would I pay $40 when I could pay $10? Because you can’t tell the difference.
I had the same issue with Thrifty in San Jose. I had planned ahead and brought proof that my card covered but he said it wasn’t good enough. Said it had to be specifically addressed to Thrifty Costa Rica. Called Chase, they said they could fax but couldn’t address it to Thrifty cuz it defaulted to “to whom it may concern”.
That is insane. Can’t imagine why it matters who it is addressed to. It’s either true or it isn’t.
So you probably hit a dozen or two countries a year but don’t bother keeping your vaccines current? Do what you want with your own health, but you’re risking spreading diseases all over to places that aren’t prepared to deal with them. You’re not just risking getting yellow fever, you’re risking spreading it to other people & places.
http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/schedules/downloads/adult/adult-schedule.pdf
But… but they’re expensive.
Truth be told, a couple years ago we went in to do all that and asked the prices and it would have added up to just way too much. I mean we honestly didn’t have any money, so we just didn’t do it.
Drew – check out your county health office next time you’re in town. I don’t know if they do this for travel related vaccines, but most county health offices administer vaccines for a very trivial cost. When we lived in Green Bay it was $9 per vaccine, which you put into a plain envelope in cash or check that they put in a big pile that they didn’t look at until the end of the day. i.e. we want people to be vaccinated and we don’t want money to be the factor that keeps them from doing it.
I’m pretty blasé about vaccines as well, and for years I ignored them telling me I should get a tetanus booster (I used to give/sell plasma and they paid me extra because my blood had high levels of tetanus antibodies in my blood, so why would I get a tetanus booster?). Anyway, then I learned while researching vaccines for my children, that it’s not so much the tetanus that’s important but the pertussis vaccination that it’s bundled with (along with diphtheria). Pertussis is whooping cough and dangerous for tiny babies, who are too young to have received the vaccine. Therefore us adults need to be immune so that it doesn’t travel through the population to the babies. I don’t know why doctors/nurses don’t say that, rather than “oh, you’re due for a tetanus vaccine, it’s been more than 10 years”, which isn’t very convincing for me.
That’s interesting. Yea, see. I went all my life without health insurance, so my view on how important these things are is quite different than most americans. Not saying I’m right, it’s just my default.
But $9 is totally in my budget. Maybe I’ll call around when we visit my sister soon.
I thought county public health services would be cheap, but here was my bill from Dallas county:
Inactivated Polio – $45
Hep A (first dose) – $50
Oral Typhoid – $50
Yellow Fever – $135
Japanese Encephalitis (first dose) – $250+ (I skipped that one!)
It turns out that my family doctor could have given me Hep A, Typhoid, and Polio for cheaper. I got my second round of Hep A from her.
In Florida this year, we had a quoted price online a month ahead of $93 for days after taxes and fees…..WRONG! $143 after we arrived due to adding an inssurance we didn’t need but had no choice. Another interesting thing was we were scheduled to land at 10:45pm, so the company had our pickup scheduled at 11:30pm. After landing we got to the counter at 10:55pm and the lady said, ”you’re lucky, we close at 11.”….WTF! That was they’re schedule, not ours!
That’s funny because the time I rented a car before this I showed up at the last minute and she lectured me on making a last minute booking because they almost didn’t have a car. But… why let me book then? What kind of computers are they using?
If it’s any consolation, once you get a yellow fever shot it’s good for 10 years! You might as well just do it and not have to worry about it. You never know when a fantastic deal to Africa might come up!
I was uncomfortable enough with driving in Costa Rica that I used either public buses or tourist shuttles that go from hotel to hotel. I did the math and considering the cost of a automatic car, gas, insurance, bad roads, the risk of corrupt cops, car hire scams and thieves who target rental cars it was roughly the same.
Yea, I need to do that. I can’t believe I’ve now paid for it but still don’t have it!
Btw, we picked our parks based on your suggestions. Unfortunately it rained a lot. :-/ But I’ll write about it later.
Agree 100% with Tara about the $$ comparability between public and private transport vs rental cars in CR. I was in CR for 3 weeks last Oct, and of all the tourists I visited with there (dozens), 95% did NOT rent a car on purpose, and the other 5% wished they hadn’t. The rest of us all used either public transport or tourist cars/buses.
I ended up hiring a driver for most of my trip who turned out to be a fantastic tour guide as well as driver – and when adding up the total costs later, happily discovered I spent *less* than a rental car would have been, plus I made a local friend and got to experience CR from a local’s perspective. Will definitely do it that way again when in CR again this Fall.
I totally believe that you could have spent less with a driver.
David… can you provide contact info, etc for the driver you used? mikejj7881@gmail.com
Oh, and the word you may be searching for is “extortion” or possibly “shakedown”?
Or “Gringo tax”! Drew, hope you guys enjoyed the parks in spite of the rain. This is technically the “green season” which is a nice way of saying rainy season. We were there in late August which seems to have a reliable break in the rainy season and had mostly good weather. Looking forward to seeing your trip report and pics!
We’re going to several African countries in a couple months, only doing the car rental in South Africa and Mauritius. We’re DIYing Madagascar & Tanzania with a hired car/driver and lodges booked separately. It’s a pita because if you book an organized safari they all want bank transfers and don’t take credit cards. Some lodges will take credit cards if you book direct and you can pay cash for car/drivers.
It didn’t rain at all on the last day until we started driving back, so that was nice.
Man that sounds like an awesome African trip. Insane. How are you booking the flights? Going from Mauritius to Madagascar? Did you book this trip last year?
Make an appointment with your doctor and go over all your vaccinations. As much as you travel, you want to be protecting your own health, and, as Andrew mentions, that of others. If you stayed above 2300m in Colombia, you know there was no risk, and your methods didn’t create any. But if it was below that, you really want to follow regulations.
I agree the car rental industry in general gets slimier all the time. Do they realize what they’re doing to their reputation? It’s the only business I can think of that I deal with regularly where I go in each time wondering if I’ll be scammed.
Yea, I’m just so cheap. But I want to get to Africa next year, so I think it’s time anyways. Both are good points.
Used car salesmen and car rental people. Something about cars.
In May 2013, the World Health Organization determined that a yellow fever vaccination gives you lifelong protection and that ten-year boosters are not necessary.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/10073101/Quick-end-unlikely-for-yellow-fever-boosters.html
Interesting, the article mentions that last time there was similar change in 1973 by WHO i.e. elimination of cholera certificates, it took 17 years for all countries to change their entry requirements.
CDC has not updated their website yet.
I got my yellow fever vaccination forty years ago, taking a detour to Beirut while travelling the overland route from Europe to India.
Oh wow. Given that it’s lifelong, I should get it as young as possible so I get the most for my money. See now I’m able to put a frugal spin on it. 😉
Thanks for the comment.
You can get your yellow fever vaccination done for free in a lot of countries. For example, Argentina gives free vaccination to citizen’s and tourists alike in Buenos Aires and some of the larger cities.
I understand that some vaccines are expensive, but you really shouldn’t be lying and bribing your way through these regulations as that’s exactly how disease spreads.
Yeah, given how many times you guys are in cheapo countries, I’m amazed you haven’t gotten the shots while overseas.
It is true some of the tropical vaccine prices are extortionate in the USA — and even if you have insurance, it’s not covered. But if you happen to be overseas, you can often get the shots cheap. Like we were headed to Zambia and we knew the South Africans would require us to have a yellow fever booklet to enter (everyone knew that the part of Zambia we were in had no zero yellow fever, but rules are rules). But we happen to be in Ecuador a couple months earlier and got our yellow fever shots for a few dollars.
BTW, I (and I’m sure others) are a bit shocked that you don’t research this “nuts and bolts” kind of travel stuff given the incredibly complex (and useful) travel schemes you blog about. The lack of basic travel research combined with mega travel research strikes me as, well, strange.
Maybe next time we’re in Bangkok. That would be perfect.
See but if I mega researched every country it would be impossible. I sometimes arrive and don’t know anything about the country, city or even what hotel I’m at. I have literally booked international flights a few hours before the flight. I try to keep my basic understanding up, but that’s largely trial and error.
It’s kind of like having insurance. Sure, when your car got hit you didn’t pay a thing. But you also paid tens of thousands of dollars in your life. If people were able to take the big blows they would save money in the long run.
It’s kinda like that. I save a lot of time by not researching a thing. And then every once in a while I pay for it. Over all I think I come out ahead. 😀
Your attitude is going to bite you in the nether regions sooner or later. And you’ll be screwed. Do you have any retirement savings? 6 month emergency savings? Health plan?
Living day to day is great. Until it isn’t. Then what are you going to do? Rely on handouts from friends and family and be another taker of government benefits? SMH.
See I woke up that morning and thought, I should be lying and bribing my way to Costa Rica… and I think that’s where I went wrong.
Wow, that car rental nightmare — and with a name-brand like Thrifty — horrendous. I personally hate such uncertainty — and I try to have it all worked out in advance. (part of why the express lines with other rental agencies are so welcome) But your nightmare suggests a standard extortion shake-down operates elsewhere…. For near term travel, I’d been contemplating car rentals for trips in Jamaica and Cancun….. but now I’m thinking if I can’t get this in detailed black ‘n white before we go, then I’m not going….
As for the shots, wow….. you do live life dangerously, especially considering everywhere that you’ve been!!!
I mean, it seems to be an issue, in this case, not of this one brand but all the car rentals in Costa Rica. They don’t normally include insurance. But they fact that they didn’t put it as a requirement, and even gave an estimated required fees that didn’t include it… So I wouldn’t worry about that with Jamaica and Mexico… unless they have the same law.
If you go to Cancun, get the ferry to Isla Mujeres. 😉 Although, a car won’t help on the tiny island, the north end of the island is cool because you can wade in the water for hundreds of feet.
I’m a big fan of your blog, but have to agree that you shouldn’t be skirting around vaccinations. You may be ok with taking the risk for yourself, but if you’re also putting others at risk. Worst case scenario: you save some money on your travels and unknowingly are responsible for killing someone. Sure the chances are slim, but that’s some really nasty karma.
Indeed. This post has well convinced me that this is something I should go ahead and invest in. I’ll be in Hong Kong soon, maybe I’ll do it there.
Wow. Sorry to hear what you guys have been through. I’d call the car rental scam a case of “gleecing the gringo”…. Do you guys speak any Spanish at all? … I’m a native speaker so at least in Spanish-speaking countries they can’t get away with that sort of sh*t, although at car rental agencies they do that to everyone, not just the gringos… hopefully the awesome fun you guys are probably having will ease the sting… with regards to the yellow fever vaccine, you guys should eventually get it… I knew someone who got it and the symptoms are bad if you get a severe case (some people only get a mild case, but it’s up to chance…)
Typo. Meant to write “fleecing the gringo”
Un poquito. Yea, I mean, we got to see crocodiles, toucans, spider monkeys… so yea, it was probably worth the $123. But yea still annoying.
Honestly we haven’t been to places where we would have likely gotten it. We stayed in Cali. However, indeed. As we hope to see more of Africa next year… its a must.
I had the same problem at Thrifty in SJO. The law in CR actually does require the extra insurance. I argued with the guy for a half hour and then told him I would just sit in the chairs until he processed my rental properly. He claimed he was ‘unable’ to call corporate to verify the policy…its a huge game and scam. In the end I got my car at the listed price on my Amex Platinum with primary insurance. I agree though I HATE renting cars especially outside the US. The car was invaluable and made trip much smoother.
Meant to say the law does NOT require the insurance. Phone posting…
Just for comparison sake, I actually had a really good experience at Dollar Car Rental in Costa Rica. $210 for a full week, no guff regarding my CSP covering the insurance… Didnt mind us bringing the car back all dirty either. Good customer service (for CR especially.)