Rental Car Vignette Rules: Does Your Hire Car Have One?

The honest answer is "often, but check". Switzerland sells only an annual vignette, valid from 1 December of the previous year to 31 January of the following year. So a Swiss-registered car in regular use on Swiss motorways will usually carry one. The duty to have one, however, attaches to using the motorway, not to the rental contract.

Checking is harder here than anywhere else. A sticker sits on the inside of the windscreen, so look for it and make sure it is the current year's. An e-vignette is invisible. The federal customs office's public check shows it only if the buyer set it to "publicly viewable", at purchase or later. A rental company may not have done that. If you see no sticker, ask the desk to confirm in writing whether the car has an e-vignette, or to switch its public visibility on. Do not simply buy a second one to be safe: the customs office refunds e-vignettes only in narrow cases, such as a proven duplicate purchase in its own webshop.

A car rented in France, Germany or Italy is a different story: buy the Swiss vignette yourself before reaching the motorway. It also covers Liechtenstein. Unlike Austria, Switzerland has no waiting period for online purchases. Swiss law gives online buyers no right of withdrawal, so the customs office says an e-vignette from its webshop is valid straight after purchase. If you type a foreign plate wrongly there, the webshop lets you correct it once within 24 hours of purchase. Vignetim sells the Swiss e-vignette against your hire car's plate.

A car rented in Germany, Italy or Switzerland needs an Austrian vignette from the first metre of motorway. ASFINAG's Vignettenevidenz shows, for a plate and country of registration, which vignette is on file and when it expires.

Buy it from ASFINAG: shop.asfinag.at, the ASFINAG app, toll stations, vending machines, petrol stations or motoring-club offices. Timing matters. The digital 1-day and 10-day vignettes start immediately, but a digital 2-month or annual vignette bought online is valid from the 18th day at the earliest. That delay comes from the 14-day statutory withdrawal period plus a postal allowance. Bought in person, any digital vignette is valid straight away. If the rental company swaps your car, ASFINAG allows one plate change per validity period without giving a reason, against an €18 expense reimbursement.

No vignette costs €200 in substitute toll for a car. Pay it and the matter ends; leave it unpaid and an administrative penalty of €300 to €3,000 follows.

Slovenia's e-vignette (vinjeta) is required on motorways and expressways, and a car hired in Italy, Austria or Croatia carries only what its own country requires. Run the plate through DARS's "Check validity" tool before you cross: if no valid e-vignette exists, the search returns nothing.

Two details matter for rentals. The vehicle class depends on height above the front axle: class 2A up to 1.30 m, class 2B above it, so a tall van or minibus may need 2B. And, as DARS's own FAQ states, the e-vignette cannot be transferred to another registration number, and a weekly or monthly vignette bought for the wrong plate is not refunded. Wait until you have the keys, then buy. The fine for driving without one is a flat €300. Get the Slovenian e-vignette for the plate you are actually driving.

• Czechia: the e-vignette covers four-wheeled vehicles up to 3.5 tonnes, and the official portal tells you whether a plate has a valid vignette or an exemption. Without one, the driver faces up to 5,000 CZK on the spot or up to 20,000 CZK in administrative proceedings. See the Czech e-vignette options.
• Slovakia: Slovak law runs two tracks. The driver commits an offence: €50 to €200 on the spot, €100 to €500 in proceedings. The keeper commits a separate administrative offence when a camera records the car, settled by a €150 order. For a rental, that order lands with the rental company first. Buy the Slovak e-vignette before the border.

• Bulgaria: the vignette is valid only for the plate declared at purchase, and the official BG Toll checker (check.bgtoll.bg) takes the country of registration and the plate. A car without one pays a compensatory fee; settling it at the roadside check or within 14 days avoids the separate fine. From 1 August 2026 that fee is €46.50 for a car. The Bulgarian e-vignette is sold in daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly and annual versions.
• Romania: the rovinieta is needed on ordinary national roads as well as motorways. The official check on erovinieta.ro asks for both the plate and the chassis number (VIN), which is printed on the car's registration document. If your hire car is registered in Romania, the law lets you pay the rovinieta for the current day until midnight of the following day; a foreign-registered car gets no such window. Since 1 October 2026, the bridge tolls at Fetești-Cernavodă, Giurgeni-Vadu Oii and the Romanian side of Giurgiu-Ruse are gone, but the rovinieta itself stays. Get the Romanian rovinieta for the plate on your rental agreement.
• Moldova: outside the EU, so a rental car needs both the company's permission and insurance valid there (see below). The official system registers the vinieta against the plate alone, and the fine for driving without one is 2,250 to 9,000 MDL. Vignetim sells the Moldovan vinieta.