JUCY vs Travellers Autobarn

Both are budget fleets of automatic vans, and both contracts confine you to sealed roads. JUCY lists seven campervans from all three airport gateways, running from a two-berth Toyota Estima up to a 7.9-metre six-berth. Travellers Autobarn lists five petrol vehicles from Auckland and Christchurch, topping out at the Hi5, which the company describes as sleeping four adults, and one of the five is a Station Wagon with no bed, no kitchen and no fridge. Heating is the shared weakness. Only JUCY’s six-berth Big Kahuna heats the living space, and JUCY qualifies that as working when connected to a powered site; Travellers Autobarn fits no built-in heater to any model and supplies a free winter pack from May to September whose electric heater also needs mains.

The sharper difference is legal. JUCY lists the Chaser, Sundaze, Condo, Sunseeker and Big Kahuna as self-contained, and its own spec tables put a fixed toilet in all five; the Crib and the Cloudbreak carry no such claim. Travellers Autobarn lists the Chubby, HiTop, Kuga and Hi5 as self-contained, but its terms, effective 19 June 2026, say that for ‘certain campervans’ the certificate depends on a NZ$50 portable toilet issued at pick-up and is not valid without one. Since 7 June 2026 the green warrant is the only certification New Zealand recognises, and the Department of Conservation requires the toilet to be fixed to the floor of the vehicle. A portable unit cannot carry one. Neither company publishes a per-model warrant number or issue date, so this is a claim to verify at the counter rather than at the booking screen.

The effect on your route is a campsite on more nights than either badge suggests. Certification is per vehicle rather than per company, so ask for the green warrant card and check it is displayed in the van before you drive away; freedom camping without one where the national rule applies carries a NZ$400 infringement fee, and failing to display a card NZ$200. Outside high summer the heating settles it anyway, because on either fleet the heat only arrives plugged in. That charge lands on every night of the trip, so weigh these two on the total cost of the booking rather than on the daily rate.