What to know before hiring a Moskvich 5
Most of what goes wrong with a car hire is not mechanical. It is a document that expired, a fuel policy nobody read, or a car that behaves in an unexpected way on the first slip road. This is the briefing we give people on the phone, written down so you can read it before booking rather than after.
The gearbox will surprise you once
Start here, because it is the only thing about this car that genuinely catches people out. The Moskvich 5 uses a CVT automatic, which has no fixed gears and therefore no shift steps.
In traffic this is lovely and you will notice it within a mile. On a slip road, asking for full acceleration from 40mph sends the revs straight to peak power where they stay while the road speed catches up. The sound does not rise and fall the way your ear expects. Nothing is wrong. Squeeze rather than stamp and build speed slightly earlier, and after two days you will stop thinking about it.
We mention this because a driver who has not been told assumes the car is broken. A driver who has been told treats it as a characteristic.
Sort the DVLA check code in advance
Every hire company in the country needs to see your licence record, and the way to show it is a check code generated on the DVLA website. It expires quickly, so generate it on the morning of collection rather than the week before.
Doing this in advance takes three minutes at home and saves ten minutes of standing on your own driveway trying to remember your National Insurance number.
Bring the right proof of address
Two documents from the last three months. A bank statement or a utility bill works; a mobile phone bill sometimes does not, and a letter with no date on it never does. Check the dates before the day.
Understand the fuel policy before you drive off
Ours is like-for-like: the car arrives full, it comes back full, and nobody charges anybody anything. This is the simplest policy in the industry and also the one people forget, then return a car three-quarters full and are surprised.
The most common avoidable charge in car hire is fuel, and it is avoidable by looking at the gauge before you set off home.
Photograph the car at handover
We walk round it with you and photograph anything already marked, and we would encourage you to take your own pictures at the same time. This is not suspicion, it is record-keeping, and it protects the person who did not cause the damage — which on any given hire is usually both of us.
Know your mileage allowance
Each booking length comes with an allowance and excess miles are charged at a stated rate. If you know in advance that you are doing a long trip, say so when booking. Building the allowance in up front is almost always cheaper than paying per mile afterwards, and we would rather tell you that than collect the difference.
Tell us straight away if something happens
A kerbed wheel, a stone chip, a warning light. Early notice means we can arrange things calmly; discovery at collection means an awkward conversation and, occasionally, a car that cannot go out to the next customer. The excess is what it is either way, so there is nothing to gain from silence.
Practical things about this car specifically
It is roughly 1.70 metres tall, which clears the common 1.9 and 2.0 metre height barriers in multi-storey car parks. It is 1.85 metres wide, which is narrow enough for ordinary bays. It takes petrol, not diesel — worth saying plainly, because a turbocharged engine and a crossover body confuse people at the pump more often than you would think.
The infotainment has some oddly worded menus, a consequence of the car being rebadged from another market. Everything works; some of it reads strangely.
One thing specific to hiring rather than owning
Check your own insurance before you assume you need anything extra. Some personal policies extend limited cover to a hired vehicle and some credit cards include an excess reimbursement product that you are already paying for. Neither is universal and neither should be assumed, but both are worth five minutes of reading before anybody sells you a duplicate.
The reason we mention it is that the counter upsell industry depends on nobody checking. We do not sell excess reduction at all, so we have no stake in what you find — but you should find out rather than buy twice.
The short version
Generate the check code that morning, bring two dated proofs of address, look at the fuel gauge before you set off home, expect the gearbox to sound unusual once, and tell us immediately if anything happens. Do those five things and a hire is genuinely uneventful.
If anything here is unclear, ask before booking rather than at the handover — and if you are ready, Moskvich 5 hire in Salford starts at a single day.