Car rental in US

Hello!

Just sorting travel plans for Christmas, and have a quick one on car rental on trips back to the US.

I’m American, resident in the UK for the past three years, and no longer have a valid US licence, but have a valid UK licence.

Planning to rent a car in the US on my UK licence, booked with a UK credit card, but have a nagging fear when I hand over my American passport they will suddenly get very weird. Anyone experience this?

I’m flying into Atlanta, and am originally from Georgia, and for background the fear stems from years ago. I’d moved to NYC, flew home to GA for a long weekend, but they refused to rent a car to me because they viewed me as ‘local’ despite the fact I’d just flown in and had a return flight booked.

Thinking that was just one unlucky run-in with an inexperienced agent many moons ago, but anyone done this recently and have any reassuring stories or words of caution?

Can't comment on your original query as I've not rented a car myself (usually my parents will rent the car on my behalf) and my US license is still valid (as it's the address used is my parents house, etc.) but I just wanted to comment to reassure you that it does sound like your past experience might've been one unlucky run-in with a reallly crappy company. I can't imagine a company that WOULDN'T rent to you even if you were local! That sounds so incredibly bizarre. Why would they only be renting to non-residents in the first place? What do you do if you have a car accident - for example - and need a rental car to help while you wait for your car to be repaired? Sounds really bizarre and something that I wouldn't worry about too much (hopefully somebody else will come along with more recent and relevant experience than mine).

I flew into Atlanta about 5 years ago and rented a car and it was fine.  I can't remember exactly but I probably did use my UK driving license and US passport.  They upgraded me to some monster behomoth of a 4 X 4 and for some reason all the possible insurance was included in the very low price.    Doesn't mean much, but hope it makes you feel better.  By the way, if you have kids it might be worth it to bring your own car seats.  It doesn't count for your luggage and they are super expensive to rent from the car rental agencies.   They also won't allow you to leave unless there is a car seat for kids.  One agency allowed us to borrow the car seat for long enough to go to the store and buy one, which was super nice of them. 

In 2017 I flew back to Texas to help our sone move and hired a car for 2 weeks. I know that my Texas DL expired on my birthday some months before so I’m pretty sure I used by UK DL and US passport.

Thanks so much @x0Kiss0fDeath @jimbocz @durhamlad!

Helpful to hear that others have done this, and will put my mind at ease now, thank you! I did notice that all the insurance was included in the quotes, which is amazing but at the same time makes me extra annoyed about how much I always had to pay while living in the US for all of those insurance add-ons!
 
I keep trying to remember the details of why I had such an issue that one time years ago, it may well be that I was still on a Georgia licence even though I had moved, because it never happened again once I had a NY licence. In any case, I’m going to let it go and manifest positivity for this go round!