. The concept is the same, you can get, a car hopefully a stone throw away from where you live, and you pay by the hour. There's a daily charge that usually equal to the charge of 10 hour use and a certain mileage is included. Petrol is free but they do charge you by the mile.
I'd go with Streetcar first as they were the first major player in London,
Streetcar
Pros:
* Much higher availability in London compared to Zipcar. They've hit the critical mass first.
* Have higher variety of cars, including "premium cars" such as BMW 1 and 3. Mainly due to the first point I believe.
* Different charge scheme, hourly, daily, weekly and monthly. The longer you reserve the car the cheaper the daily cost is. Zipcar only has hourly and daily rates.
* Includes Streetvan membership.
* Higher free mileage for booking over 72 hours, 200 miles compared to Zipcar's 60.
* One way trip (albeit at a cost)
Cons:
* High cost to reduce excess to 0. £14.95/month equates to £179.4/year.
* Less mileage per day for booking under 72 hours. Streetcar has 30 miles free vs Zipcar's 60 miles.
Zipcar
Pros:
* Worldwide availability. Not just London, Zipcar is a global company and your Zipcard will work overseas.
* Much cheaper fee to reduce excess to 0. £60/year compared to Streetcar's £179.4/year
* Higher free mileage for booking under 72 hours, 60 mile compared to Streetcar's 30 (but Streetcar's have more mileage for booking over 72 hours).
* Different membership scheme, occasional (basic), EVP50, EVP100 etc.
* Cheaper to book during weekdays in general compared to Streetcar (Streetcar does not differentiate weekdays/weekend booking apart from Mon-Fri).
Cons:
* Less availability in London.
* Not a whole of different cars you can get. In London most of them are Golf.
* Less free mileage for long booking (60 vs Streetcar's 200).
Negligible differences
* Annual cost (Streetcar's £59 vs Zipcar's £50)
* Extra mileage (23p for both of them)
* Both pay London's congestion charge
Summary
So in summary, not a whole of differences between the two. They both target the similar demographic and priced accordingly. I'm sure one has better value than the other depending on your usage pattern.
I personally use Zipcar because they have decent enough availability near my area and they were doing £25/year membership promotion and also they are much cheaper in zeroing the insurance excess cost. Since my usage pattern is on the low end side I don't want to pay the extra cost that Streetcar charge to zero the insurance excess. However if you need higher availability then perhaps Streetcar is a better choice.
Disclaimer: I tried to make this comparison as accurate as possible on the 5th April 2010, but to err is human. I made no claim whatsoever that this comparison is 100% accurate or factual. If I'm wrong I'm more than happy to be corrected.
