Portugal Car Hire Issue

[TownIdiot]

This may end up more like a rant than anything and if so I apologise in advance

I collected a car at Faro Airport at 2130 last night. After a crap collection experience I drove off in a fiat 500.
20 mins into the drive to our villa the dashboard lights up like a Christmas tree with engine management, triangle with exclamation mark and check engine. It also starts driving like a dog with misfiring and hesitancy under load.


Rather than call for recovery or turn round I decide to plough on and make it to my destination.

I called them and they said they can collect the vehicle but I need to go back to the airport to get the replacement. I don't want to do this as it will be a three hour round trip so I asked them to collect and cancel the rest of the hire with a refund.
Apparently they can't do this either and will only cancel if I go to the airport.

The vehicle is still outside as they can't find the address apparently and I'll be off out for a long lunch shortly. I'd normally get a cab to and from the airport for about the same cost as the car hire - don't need a car for the rest of the week and can get a cab back to airport when it's time to return to the UK.


I paid in full upfront, unfortunately with a debit card I use for holiday spending.

I suppose my question is what are my options here? All I want them to do is refund the hire cost and petrol deposit. And I'm not going to the airport to do that as it will be half a day lost of a short trip.

[Simon Brooks]

Tell them you have tried to drive the vehicle and it will not respond in a safe and drivable manner, they therefore need to arrange lowloader collection from your location with either a full refund or a replacement vehicle delivered to you

Out of interest which hire company, only ask as I have a home on the Algarve and only ever use one hire company (hoping its not them)

[moffspeed]

Agree with Simon - a lot depends on the reputation of the hirer. Most of the bigger companies eg Hertz, Avis & Guerin (my favoured company) have sub-depots across the Algarve as well as their main Faro bases. So maybe a closer depot for you if there really was a need for face to face paperwork or if you decided to choose a replacement car.

Portuguese post codes work really well so don’t understand how they failed to find your address….

[TownIdiot]

Thanks for the replies

They are collecting the car and I've said I'd like a replacement or a refund.
They say this is only possible if I go to the airport.

Which i am not going to do until I am due to go home.

I used Gold car. Have used them in the past with no issues and they do a service where you can checkin online a just pick the keys up when you arrive and drive off. Paid €35 for that and it didn't work.
So they will be on the st list going forward.

I reckon the reason they said they couldn't find the address earlier is because they weren't here and it's an excuse



Edited to add. Car now collected.
The won't refund so will go to the desk when I am going back and see what they say there.

Not really holding out any hope as everyone I've spoken to has been unbelievably unhelpful.

I won't be surprised if they try and charge me for the petrol and the recover mileage, so I've frozen that card for the time being.

Edited by TownIdiot on Tuesday 1st October 13:36

[moffspeed]

If you used the motorway don’t forget that they’ll also be trying to hit you for transponder hire and any tolls.

Really have sympathy for your plight, I used your chosen car hire company once and, for about 1,000 reasons, vowed never to use them again.

[//j17]

TownIdiot said:

I won't be surprised if they try and charge me for the petrol and the recover mileage, so I've frozen that card for the time being.

Did you use the debit card for the security deposit? If so freezing the card won't make difference as there will be a pre-authorization for the amount of the deposit. Effectively you've already said they can take upto that amount from your card and the money's been set to one side so frozen or not they can still complete a transaction for upto that amount.

[TownIdiot]

//j17 said:

Did you use the debit card for the security deposit? If so freezing the card won't make difference as there will be a pre-authorization for the amount of the deposit. Effectively you've already said they can take upto that amount from your card and the money's been set to one side so frozen or not they can still complete a transaction for upto that amount.

I paid a total amount that was supposed to allow me to collect a key and go.

About 180 of that is fuel and toll deposit. The rest rental and nil excess insurance.

Will see what they say when I get to the airport at the weekend

[Gnevans]

Do you have recovery cover included? I was surprised to learn that some companies don’t cover this unless you buy their additional insurance. I’d rather use a bus than Goldcar.

[TownIdiot]

Gnevans said:

Do you have recovery cover included? I was surprised to learn that some companies don’t cover this unless you buy their additional insurance. I’d rather use a bus than Goldcar.

Yes - apparently with a mileage a charge.

No way I should be paying that with a faulty car rather than a specific incident.


As a company they are are quite impressive in the uniformity of their surliness

[hellorent]

Ah Goldcar, no surprise at that, a bit late now but look at their reviews,

As a side with regard to the address Whatsapp have a good feature, if you go to send a message on chat, click on the staple icon and click on Location and it will send your location to the recipient it's accurate to about 4 meters and really quick to use.

[TownIdiot]

hellorent said:

Ah Goldcar, no surprise at that, a bit late now but look at their reviews,

As a side with regard to the address Whatsapp have a good feature, if you go to send a message on chat, click on the staple icon and click on Location and it will send your location to the recipient it's accurate to about 4 meters and really quick to use.

I've done the WhatsApp thing - basically they were lying. The driver who collected the car said he'd not left the depot on the previous "attempt" - two calls centre operatives said they'd got to the village and couldn't find us or get hold of me.
I've definitely got an issue receiving calls but not texts, WhatsApps or voicemail.

I reckon they will just ignore it now until I get to the airport then tell me to do one when I ask for the contract to be terminated from when the car stopped working.

This will teach me to be sensible. Should have stuck with the plan, got pissed at the airport and got a transfer over.

[moffspeed]

Stuff them, life is too short without pond-life organisations like GC sticking a spanner in the works.

It’s a gorgeous evening here on the Algarve. The weather is set fair all week, enjoy the sun, people, food, beaches etc.

Order another girafa and move on.

[TownIdiot]

Just to round this off
They collected the car and to get either a refund or replacement I had to go back to the airport.

Had a free day today so thought i'd go and sort it.

Rang them in advance to be told they couldn't do anything and I'd need to go to the airport. Which I did

Got there and told them I wanted a refund
He passed me an email address and said email this and they will work something out.

I was struggling to keep my st together at this stage so said forget that I'll have a car.

fked about for 20 mins and gave me a complimentary upgrade to an automatic corsa. Cheers for that.

They win a prize for literally every employee being a surly ignorant tt.

Edited by TownIdiot on Thursday 3rd October 19:26

[havoc]

hellorent said:

Ah Goldcar, no surprise at that, a bit late now but look at their reviews,

Yep. Sorry OP, but as it's Goldcar and a debit card I think you're out of luck.

For future reference (or anyone finding this thread), TripAdvisor forums are usually spot-on when it comes to car hire company recommendations (at least for Europe - in the USA the bigger companies are apparently all pretty good and it's the smaller operators which are hit and miss).

We used TravelRent, booked through Zest (UK screen-scraper for Portugal). Both did exactly what they said on the tin, car was a lightly-scratched and scraped, but still eminently usable, current-gen Megane diesel. The price was...pretty sensible.

[ninepoint2]

Zit Auto are very good, used them for years and never had any issues, though we now use Avis as we get a family discount and again they too have been good

[Griffith4ever]

Never , ever, pay their excess cover (any cheap car hire co.). Take your own out. It covers breakdown recovery too. And only pay / block the deposit on a credit card. never on a debit card.

[TownIdiot]

And it looks like someone reversed into it when it was parked up last night

Nothing major, but the bumper has popped out and it's scratched.

Such a shame.

[T1547]

Sorry to hear Op.

We just returned from a few days near Lagos and now pleased we went for the (admittedly pricey) transfers from/to the airport. Why is car hire so often such a stressful process, seems like an industry that needs some more stringent rules/regulation.

[Griffith4ever]

T1547 said:

Sorry to hear Op.

We just returned from a few days near Lagos and now pleased we went for the (admittedly pricey) transfers from/to the airport. Why is car hire so often such a stressful process, seems like an industry that needs some more stringent rules/regulation.

I sincerely hope not. We live in a world where regulation and rules are being pushed on businesses that ultimately cost all of us more money, and its almost always to protect those that have not done due dilligence.

- Banks now have to refund just about everyone if they are careless with their bank accounts / money. WE will all pay for this.
- Insurance companies have had the practice of slipping high renewals past the lazy curtailed, so now all of us that could be bothered to shop around are paying more (to subsidize the careless/lazy).
- I, along with the entire UK population, have to answer alergy questions every single time I eat now, because people with severe allergies have occasionally forgotton to mention they'll die if they eat shellfish.

Dirt cheap car hire companies exist because they make their money from the ill prepared / lazy. How on earth can DoYouSpain / Goldcar hire me a car for 1 week in Valencia for 1.5 Euros a day? They can't. They make their money on the very expensive insurance they push at you when you go to collect. If you don't take it out, and you are not self insured and you have an incident or scratch, it's going to cost you dearly.

I'm always self insured, and its never cost me for any claim, but, I'm very much aware my cheap car hire is subsidised by those that take out the expensive insurance, or, don't have any insurance and suffer a scratch on the car. The emails you get when you hire could not be more clear. They all warn you to arrange insurance (theirs preferably!) before you leave, and they all tell you they are going to put a big block on your CC if you use your own insurance. And they all warn you of the stratospheric costs if you incur even the smallest blemish. They also usually (always in my experience) tell you breakdown cover is extra (and tyres, and underbody). But - annual car hire insurance covers ALL this including breakdoow recover, tyres, and windscreens.

I don't find cheap car stressful - you get what you pay for - I accept I've got to be prepared, I might have to walk down the road from the airport to find them, I might have to queue a while, and I KNOW they'll try to hard sell me extras. I'm fine with all that if I can rent a car for £10 a day (I just did that in Croatia - and a very nice car it was too).

It would be criminal if cheap car hire were to get over regulated. Leave that to Avis and Hertz - let those that are happy to pay, pay, and those of us that like no frills car hire, pay less.

[T1547]

Griffith4ever said:

I sincerely hope not. We live in a world where regulation and rules are being pushed on businesses that ultimately cost all of us more money, and its almost always to protect those that have not done due dilligence.

- Banks now have to refund just about everyone if they are careless with their bank accounts / money. WE will all pay for this.
- Insurance companies have had the practice of slipping high renewals past the lazy curtailed, so now all of us that could be bothered to shop around are paying more (to subsidize the careless/lazy).
- I, along with the entire UK population, have to answer alergy questions every single time I eat now, because people with severe allergies have occasionally forgotton to mention they'll die if they eat shellfish.

Dirt cheap car hire companies exist because they make their money from the ill prepared / lazy. How on earth can DoYouSpain / Goldcar hire me a car for 1 week in Valencia for 1.5 Euros a day? They can't. They make their money on the very expensive insurance they push at you when you go to collect. If you don't take it out, and you are not self insured and you have an incident or scratch, it's going to cost you dearly.

I'm always self insured, and its never cost me for any claim, but, I'm very much aware my cheap car hire is subsidised by those that take out the expensive insurance, or, don't have any insurance and suffer a scratch on the car. The emails you get when you hire could not be more clear. They all warn you to arrange insurance (theirs preferably!) before you leave, and they all tell you they are going to put a big block on your CC if you use your own insurance. And they all warn you of the stratospheric costs if you incur even the smallest blemish. They also usually (always in my experience) tell you breakdown cover is extra (and tyres, and underbody). But - annual car hire insurance covers ALL this including breakdoow recover, tyres, and windscreens.

I don't find cheap car stressful - you get what you pay for - I accept I've got to be prepared, I might have to walk down the road from the airport to find them, I might have to queue a while, and I KNOW they'll try to hard sell me extras. I'm fine with all that if I can rent a car for £10 a day (I just did that in Croatia - and a very nice car it was too).

It would be criminal if cheap car hire were to get over regulated. Leave that to Avis and Hertz - let those that are happy to pay, pay, and those of us that like no frills car hire, pay less.

But the above doesn’t really speak to the type of situation that the OP found themselves in, as just one example. There should be clear requirements on car hire operators in this type of situation.

I agree over regulation isn’t helpful but for it to be generally less of a minefield and some better/basic consumer protections in place would seem only beneficial and will stop such ‘gotcha’ tactics from operators.