National's Emerald Aisle Executive Area is what most of my clients prefer, when available, for their car rentals, so I decided to check AMEX Platinum and Chase Sapphire Reserve benefits for National Car Rental for an upcoming law school reunion where I'll need a rental car.
Living in NYC without a car, I'm personally not worried about primary or secondary car rental insurance, since for me, everything is de facto primary car rental insurance, as I have no other car rental insurance. But for those who do have a car and car rental insurance, note that AMEX car rental insurance is secondary to your personal car rental insurance, while Chase cards such as the Chase Sapphire Reserve, Chase Sapphire Preferred and Ink Business Preferred offer primary car rental insurance. Don't forget that, regardless of primary CDW insurance coverage, you still need to purchase liability insurance, for any potential injuries to third parties and damage to their property, unless you already have a comprenhensive umbrella policy that covers this.
But back to the topic of the post: National Car Rental benefits. Here's what each card provides:
AMEX Platinum: National Car Rental Emerald Club Executive Status
Emerald Club is free for anyone to join, but normally Executive Status requires 12 car rentals or 40 rental days; with the AMEX Platinum or AMEX Business Platinum you enjoy this status complimentary, after registering for it (note that it can take up to 7 business days for your Emerald Club member number to reflect Executive status). Executive benefits include:
- Access to the Executive Area of the Emerald Aisle: you can select any full size and above vehicle in the Executive Area, when booking the mid size rate (U.S. and Canada).
- You'll earn a free rental day faster, with 6 credits (1 credit per car rental) instead of 7 credits
- Guaranteed upgrade: when renting a full size or luxury vehicle, you'll be charged one car class less.
- Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan
- American Airlines AAdvantage
- Carlson Hotels Club Carlson
- Delta Air Lines SkyMiles
- Frontier Airlines
- Hawaiian Airlines
- Southwest Airlines
- Sun Country
- Virgin America
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When you use Chase Ultimate Rewards to book a National rental, can you still pick from the executive aisle? On the Chase rewards booking site I see that the exec. aisle isn’t mentioned. It also doesn’t look like the Emerald Club discount is applied.