Texas auto · Rental cars
Your policy follows you only as far as the coverages you already bought
Liability on a Texas personal auto policy often follows the driver into a short-term rental. Collision and comprehensive follow only if you already carry them, and only if the rental qualifies as a temporary substitute or a non-owned private passenger car. Liability alone does not repair the rental company’s car. “Full coverage” means liability plus collision plus comprehensive. It does not include a rental-car waiver unless that waiver is actually on your declarations.
Texas requires liability for most drivers. The personal floor is 30/60/25. That floor pays other people, up to those limits. Damage to the car you are renting is physical damage, and it is yours only if collision or comprehensive is on your policy and the form extends it. Exotic cars, cargo vans used for work, long-term rentals, and driving outside the United States often sit outside that extension. Commercial use of a rental is the commercial-auto problem, not a personal perk.
A credit card’s rental benefit, when the card offers one, is usually secondary and full of exclusions. It is not a substitute for reading whether your own collision applies. TDI’s consumer note on the counter products: rental car insurance.
Does the policy follow the car or the driver: Texas car insurance, car or driver. What the personal policy is: what Texas car insurance covers. Credit cards and rental desks: rental car insurance and credit cards. Collision, named in another state so the word stays precise: collision. Comprehensive, same idea: comprehensive. Liability, the part that is not the rental car: liability car insurance.
