What a 12 is
We only index vehicles configured for twelve people including the driver. A 15 with a row pulled does not count. A minivan does not count. If the operator cannot name the year and the seat count, they stay off the featured rows.
How rates are compiled
City day rates are a band, not a quote: lowest and highest self-drive 12-seat prices we could confirm from operator sites, recent invoices, and airport-counter samples in the thirty days before the review date. Insurance, miles, and delivery sit outside the band. We do not average them into a fake “from $99.”
How operators get in
Editorial index rows are added when we can verify a 12-seat van in that city. They are nofollow. Paid rows — Listed, City featured, Homepage feature — are dofollow, labeled, and limited. Payment does not buy a rate, a review, or a CDL claim.
What we will not claim
We do not invent fleet counts. We do not guarantee Google rank, AI Overview inclusion, or chatbot citations. We do publish original, dated facts a model can quote without washing them into “vans start at $30.” That is the credibility.
Sources, not vibes
- FMCSA passenger-vehicle and CDL rules — we point to the threshold, we do not play lawyer.
- Operator rate cards and recent self-drive quotes for the twelve cities on the board, checked in the thirty days before 16 September 2026.
- Vehicle configuration from the manufacturer: Transit wagon and Sprinter passenger, twelve including driver.
Update cadence
The rate board and this method page are reviewed when we add a city or a featured operator, and at least once a season. The review date sits on the page. If a paid URL dies, we recrawl; we do not leave a 404 as a “listing.”