Hi, Apologies in advance if this has already been covered.

Does anybody have experience with Island Car Rental?

They seem to have good rates on self described well used vehicles but i am trying to find out if they are reputable, dependable (show up to pick up as promised), etc.

Any help??

Hi Dave!

Welcome to BonaireTalk, and probably to Bonaire soon.

Island Car Rental is a small company, they have about 20 cars, and they use relatively older cars for rental, but the cars are well serviced. They have about the lowest rates available on Bonaire, at least for the official registered car-rental companies.
Because it is a small company, you may expect a more personal treat.
About the service of the cars: I have seen their cars getting serviced at the Toyota-dealer, the biggest car-dealer on the island. Personally I trust this system better then the system of some other car-rentals, who use a "handyman" to do the servicing mainly exchanging parts from one car to another, without really solving the problem.
When you see their cars driving on the roads, you cannot see that these are older cars, the bodywork is well taken care of, actually they look better then the rusty vehicles you rent from other bigger companies.
I only think the labels on the cars telling it is an Island Car-rental Car are far too large; everybody can see from miles distance that you are driving a rental car. That can also be positive, because locals can expect strange behaviour from non-island-drivers????

The guy that runs this company, Patrick, is friendly and "non-Bonairian" accurate, which means a lot here......
I have rented cars with them several times in the past, and the cars were on time, on the right place, filled-up with gas and clean, and I didn't have any technical problem at all.
Two days ago friends of mine rented a pick-up-truck at Island Car-rentals, and although the plane was too late, the car and Patrick were at the airport in time, and everything looks OK up to now.

I heard that they have ordered 5 brandnew cars to be delivered in 2 months. I hope they can keep their low rates also with the new cars....

Good luck with your choice.

Harrie

Although I have never rented from Island, I have had the pleasure of doing other business with Patrick over the years. In my dealings with Patrick, he always provided his services in a friendly, timely and professional manner.