Renting is where most visitors' trouble starts, and it almost never starts with the driving. It starts at the counter, with a contract nobody read, a deposit nobody questioned, and a scratch nobody photographed.
The two pillars here are renting a car and renting a motorbike. Read whichever applies, then the one page that saves the most money: what to photograph before you drive away. A three-minute video at handover settles almost every damage argument that follows, and the arguments that follow can be expensive.
Two things catch people repeatedly. The first is the shop that wants to keep your passport — common, and worth understanding before you agree to it. The second is the excess: not the daily rate but the number that decides what a bad day actually costs you.
Below that, a page for each of the places visitors actually rent in — Phuket, Chiang Mai, Krabi, Samui, Pattaya and the rest — covering what is different there: which roads, which hills, which ferry, and which local habits to expect. Before you sign anything, the printable handover checklist covers the whole routine in one page.
