You can book a tax-free short-term leased vehicle for less than a minimum number of days, but you have to pay for the minimum. The minimum for a Renault short-term lease is 21 days.

The price of such short-term lease is weighted on that initial block of days, a single total rate applying to the block. Another rate applies to each day beyond that block, this "additional-day" rate being much less than the per-day average cost of the initial block. Hence the longer the lease the better the deal is for you.

Naturally each vehicle has its own rate. The extremely specialized IdeaMerge software applies these rates automatically and presents you with a detailed cost breakdown before you submit an order.

The rates per se are not dependent on location and not dependent on season. Rather, the rates are set by the manufacturer near the beginning of the year and typically stay the same throughout that year. However, the rates effective for the market in your country of permanent residence are set relative to that market and the value of the Euro versus the currency of that market. Hence the rates may change considerably from year to year and occasionally within a year. Of course such rate changes are not retroactive to bookings already made.

Note that there are also pick-up and/or drop-off charges that apply to locations outside France. (The Geneva location is considered inside France.) Our online software automatically adds those charges into the total, all-inclusive price and of course includes them in the detailed cost breakdown it presents to you.

Per the pick-up and return dates and locations you submit, the vehicles shown by the IdeaMerge reservation request software are presently available for booking, according to the manufacturer. However, there’s a slight chance that such availability will change between now and the time IdeaMerge attempts to book a reservation request. (The shorter the leadtime the greater that chance.) In that case we would contact you straightaway to discuss the alternatives. Of course you would be under no obligation to accept one of those alternatives.

A US$400 deposit portion is charged to the client's credit card upon booking the short-term lease, but that deposit portion is refundable minus a US$50 cancellation fee until 30 days prior to the pick-up date; within that 30-day window it is no longer refundable. The contract and a few other papers are then drafted and sent to the client. The client is meant to read and sign these documents (the terms of which are accurately, thoroughly and redundantly represented on the IdeaMerge Website) and mail them to the relevant North American office as directed.

At the 30-day threshold before the pick-up date, the entire balance portion is charged (by default to the same credit card), but that balance portion is refundable, minus a US$100 cancellation fee, until and including the pick-up date. So, until 30 days before pick-up your risk is only US$50, but within 30 days before pick-up your risk is US$500. At said 30-day threshold, the client's copy of the contract is marked "PAID" and resent to the client — along with detailed directions about the pick-up and return procedures, depot locations, numbers to call, etc. If a lease is booked within said 30-day window, all the above occurs at once (the deposit portion therefore being non-refundable but the balance portion of course still being refundable minus its US$100 cancellation fee)....

Naturally some clients find it counterintuitive that a "lease" must be paid for upfront as such; but this is a short-term, tax-free lease — in other words, a purchase–repurchase agreement — designed for visitors to Europe. Hence, the entire cost is paid for upfront, that total amount being essentially just the difference between the implicit purchase and repurchase price. No funds change hands on the pick-up occasion or thereafter, unless during the lease the client extends the lease duration.

See our Changes/Refunds page regarding changes to your contract.

pick-up

One of the prime benefits of a French tax-free short-term auto lease in contrast to an auto rental is the precision such lease arrangement affords to you in procuring a vehicle. Which is to say, such lease contract stipulates a particular vehicle in terms of make, model and certain features (as presented on this Website) and effectively ensures that said particular vehicle will indeed be delivered to you unless the naturally ineluctable force of circumstances causes such vehicle to be actually unavailable for delivery to you on your contracted pick-up date, in which case another new vehicle reasonably considered equivalent (but not identical) to the stipulated vehicle will instead be delivered to you for your use until the contracted drop-off date. The very close temporal connection between the manufacture and delivery of these lease vehicles is what makes the aforementioned, remarkable precision of selection possible, but it likewise makes the delivery of such vehicles sensitive to circumstances such as labor strikes, vehicle recalls and natural disasters, i.e. to the veritable force of circumstances. Truly rare are the circumstances which make said replacement necessary, but they are a natural element of the industry.

buying outright