WARNING!!!!The Great Europcar Rip_Off!
Discussion
As the holiday season approaches and many of you are probably thinking
of grabbing a few weeks in the sun, possibly in Spain,and you will probably hire a car to go beach hopping. I feel that I must warn you all about a Rip-Off which Europcar are trying to pull with us.
My partner and I have been flying to Malaga for meetings every 3 or 4 weeks for the last 2 years for meetings without any problems.
In March, my partner took her usual trip and picked up the hire car from Europcar as usual and set off down the road. Within 10km the brand new Renault Clio ground to a halt with a worn out clutch. The car had 2380km on the clock when she picked the car up, hardly run in. My partner called the number for the breakdown cover to organise a replacement etc. Eventually the car was taken away by a local tow firm and my partner picked up a replacement car from the rental office, so far, so good. Off she went on her way and returned the car in one piece 2 days later.
about 3 weeks ago we found that over 3 thousand Euros were taken from our business card account, after hours on the phone trying to find out why, the culprit turned out to be Europcar, who had decided to charge us for a "broken clutch" the tow truck and ten days loss of use while the car was repaired. The clutch came to about £1300.00, I know for a fact that a clutch
for a bog standard Clio is nowhere near that price, disregarding the fact that it should have been a warranty job as the car was less than 4 weeks old, I have never heard of anyone been charged for a mechanical breakdown on a hire car! especially by a so-called reputable company!
Europcar say that the broken clutch is the drives fault, even though she had barely driven 10km on a motorway, even with my heavy right foot, I don't think I could burn out a clutch in 10 km.
The money which was taken out of our account was illegal as we had only agreed to the usual 500 euros excess, which strictly speaking is for accident damage not mechanical breakdown, so it seems that despite the counterfoil on the card agreeing to only 500 Euros maximum, they can take anything they like, I call that Fraud.
I CAN ONLY WARN EVERYBODY NOT TO USE EUROPCAR AT ALL, don't ruin your trip by getting a nasty bill a few months after you get back home!
I will keep you all posted on how my legal action goes.
of grabbing a few weeks in the sun, possibly in Spain,and you will probably hire a car to go beach hopping. I feel that I must warn you all about a Rip-Off which Europcar are trying to pull with us.
My partner and I have been flying to Malaga for meetings every 3 or 4 weeks for the last 2 years for meetings without any problems.
In March, my partner took her usual trip and picked up the hire car from Europcar as usual and set off down the road. Within 10km the brand new Renault Clio ground to a halt with a worn out clutch. The car had 2380km on the clock when she picked the car up, hardly run in. My partner called the number for the breakdown cover to organise a replacement etc. Eventually the car was taken away by a local tow firm and my partner picked up a replacement car from the rental office, so far, so good. Off she went on her way and returned the car in one piece 2 days later.
about 3 weeks ago we found that over 3 thousand Euros were taken from our business card account, after hours on the phone trying to find out why, the culprit turned out to be Europcar, who had decided to charge us for a "broken clutch" the tow truck and ten days loss of use while the car was repaired. The clutch came to about £1300.00, I know for a fact that a clutch
for a bog standard Clio is nowhere near that price, disregarding the fact that it should have been a warranty job as the car was less than 4 weeks old, I have never heard of anyone been charged for a mechanical breakdown on a hire car! especially by a so-called reputable company!
Europcar say that the broken clutch is the drives fault, even though she had barely driven 10km on a motorway, even with my heavy right foot, I don't think I could burn out a clutch in 10 km.
The money which was taken out of our account was illegal as we had only agreed to the usual 500 euros excess, which strictly speaking is for accident damage not mechanical breakdown, so it seems that despite the counterfoil on the card agreeing to only 500 Euros maximum, they can take anything they like, I call that Fraud.
I CAN ONLY WARN EVERYBODY NOT TO USE EUROPCAR AT ALL, don't ruin your trip by getting a nasty bill a few months after you get back home!
I will keep you all posted on how my legal action goes.
I have never had a hire car from Spain or Italy that has not been covered in dents if the car is over 3 days old. I had a similar situation in Malaga a while ago but I marched the guy from the hire booth by the scruff of his neck and made him check it and sign the form, plus I photographed it and him, just to make sure they got the message that I wasn't P***ing about. It's the only way, don't leave the hire car place without all the checks.
Sorry, the legal document was invalid as you signed it in a place south of the Isle of Wight.
Well, that's how it seems.
Please may you take the bastards to the cleaners. However, I do worry that you are dealing with the Spanish legal system here, which is somewhat third world at times.
I was always advised to keep hold of my credit card when paying for things anywhere south of Nice!!
Best of British luck.(we must be doing OK, we beat the West Indies at cricket!)
Well, that's how it seems.
Please may you take the bastards to the cleaners. However, I do worry that you are dealing with the Spanish legal system here, which is somewhat third world at times.
I was always advised to keep hold of my credit card when paying for things anywhere south of Nice!!
Best of British luck.(we must be doing OK, we beat the West Indies at cricket!)
Thanks Thunder, the rental was organised and paid for through Europcar UK as it was booked through Easyjet and pre paid, the only thing that was left at the counter was the counterfoil for the deposit for fuel and collision excess.
Easy jet themselves are no stranger to hire car rip offs, do you remember a few yeas ago when Easy rentacar were pulling foney rip off schemes at their london Bridge branch. Even though you got your car checked and signed when you brought it back, you got a £200 charge on your card for damage. There was a thing on TV about it, seems like they are carrying on their old tricks with their ( car hire partners)???
Easy jet themselves are no stranger to hire car rip offs, do you remember a few yeas ago when Easy rentacar were pulling foney rip off schemes at their london Bridge branch. Even though you got your car checked and signed when you brought it back, you got a £200 charge on your card for damage. There was a thing on TV about it, seems like they are carrying on their old tricks with their ( car hire partners)???
Also had problems with aforesaid company but at Manchester Airport.
Had had problems with them there before e.g. the refused to give me the final bill, refused to check the car before I flew out etc...
Had to fly home to bury my father, picked up a car on a voucher at Europcar and returned it two days later at terminal 2. They ensured me that it was OK just to drop the keys through their letterbox and all would be OK.
Then got a bill for an excess day and an empty tank, I bounced the payment and brought charges through their partners here in Germany. Europcar, I wouldn't pee on them if they were on fire, a bunch of rip-off merchants!
Had had problems with them there before e.g. the refused to give me the final bill, refused to check the car before I flew out etc...
Had to fly home to bury my father, picked up a car on a voucher at Europcar and returned it two days later at terminal 2. They ensured me that it was OK just to drop the keys through their letterbox and all would be OK.
Then got a bill for an excess day and an empty tank, I bounced the payment and brought charges through their partners here in Germany. Europcar, I wouldn't pee on them if they were on fire, a bunch of rip-off merchants!
Had a similar thing renting a Megane one-way : Airport to home in Feb. All paperwork said Megane was undamaged. Actual car had lots of scuffs, scratches and minor dings. Guy almost refused to amend the paperwork until I parked the car in front of the exit barrier and refused to move it.
Not nice people.
Not nice people.
JMGS4 said:
Also had problems with aforesaid company but at Manchester Airport.
Had had problems with them there before e.g. the refused to give me the final bill, refused to check the car before I flew out etc...
Had to fly home to bury my father, picked up a car on a voucher at Europcar and returned it two days later at terminal 2. They ensured me that it was OK just to drop the keys through their letterbox and all would be OK.
Then got a bill for an excess day and an empty tank, I bounced the payment and brought charges through their partners here in Germany. Europcar, I wouldn't pee on them if they were on fire, a bunch of rip-off merchants!
Sorry to hear that JM, that is not what you need at a time like that.Had had problems with them there before e.g. the refused to give me the final bill, refused to check the car before I flew out etc...
Had to fly home to bury my father, picked up a car on a voucher at Europcar and returned it two days later at terminal 2. They ensured me that it was OK just to drop the keys through their letterbox and all would be OK.
Then got a bill for an excess day and an empty tank, I bounced the payment and brought charges through their partners here in Germany. Europcar, I wouldn't pee on them if they were on fire, a bunch of rip-off merchants!
Skodaku said:
Had a similar thing renting a Megane one-way : Airport to home in Feb. All paperwork said Megane was undamaged. Actual car had lots of scuffs, scratches and minor dings. Guy almost refused to amend the paperwork until I parked the car in front of the exit barrier and refused to move it.
Not nice people.
Nice one Skodaku, these people need to be put in their place, too many people just roll over and take it, but not me, EUROPCAR are gonna get a good legal kicking off me and I hope I lose them thousands of pounds worth of business through all the badmouthing I'm gonna do about them.Not nice people.
If you paid by credit card ring the credit car company they will get your money back.I hired a brand new 'golf'in Barcelona to drive to Valencia after 20 miles it would only do 50 mph max they wouldn't come out to us and change the car we drove to Valencia they changed the car no problem till we got home they charged us for hire of second car and loss of use for first car.HSBC got our money back plus over night stay on motorway services.
Jim.
Jim.
indeed, phone the CC company right away. at the very least they will freeze/recover the funds from the company in question whilst they mediate the situation. more than likely they will refund you right away.
They are bound by lots of laws to protect the customer/borrower and generally do not dick about when companies start charging crap to peoples cards!
They are bound by lots of laws to protect the customer/borrower and generally do not dick about when companies start charging crap to peoples cards!
Hmmm - so it's still going on
I have two experiences of this
First was a rental in the US a long time ago when I got charged for "damage" and I was in no position to refute the claim
Second was a few years ago when after a late evening flight I din't check the rental as well as I should have done and just drove off
Next day I could see it was a bit scratched and dented in places and bearing in mind my previous experience I took some pictures with my 35mm instamatic (had a date stamp on pics)
I returned the car one week later and nothing said, 1 month later credic card charged with just over £500 for "repairs"
I had duplicates made of the pictures I took and sent them recorded to the UK rental head office - I "billed" them for loss of interest cost of photo developing, my time to write a letter and the cost of postage - about £100 in total
My card was refunded £500 and I had a cheque for £100 within a week
NOW I always agree damage on collection and take photos just after.
Which turned out handy as I am now in dispute with easyCar over a sub-contracted Eurocar rental in Cyprus.
Faults noticed on acceptance (well shrugged shoulders and "not a problem" comments from the local agent)
- Nearly every panel including the roof had dents or scrapes (only the tailgate seemed to have survived it's short life to date without incident)
- Radio didn't work due to a lack of an aerial on the roof (I didn't spot that on collection)
- Hazard light switch had a mind of it's own and popped out on a regular basis (I sorted this by wedging it in with some match sticks)
- At acceptance 119,000 km's (this is a personal record for me having never had a hire car with this sort of mileage on it)
- performance was best described as mediocre (probably due in no small part to the mileage)
- The gear leaver trim was broken and as a result road noise was far more than I would expect.
- The central locking was a bit hit and miss and you needed to make sure that it was locked physically before walking away
Current offer from easyCar customer services is £15 of the next rental to be taken in the next 6 months - but that was their opening one!!
I have two experiences of this
First was a rental in the US a long time ago when I got charged for "damage" and I was in no position to refute the claim
Second was a few years ago when after a late evening flight I din't check the rental as well as I should have done and just drove off
Next day I could see it was a bit scratched and dented in places and bearing in mind my previous experience I took some pictures with my 35mm instamatic (had a date stamp on pics)
I returned the car one week later and nothing said, 1 month later credic card charged with just over £500 for "repairs"
I had duplicates made of the pictures I took and sent them recorded to the UK rental head office - I "billed" them for loss of interest cost of photo developing, my time to write a letter and the cost of postage - about £100 in total
My card was refunded £500 and I had a cheque for £100 within a week
NOW I always agree damage on collection and take photos just after.
Which turned out handy as I am now in dispute with easyCar over a sub-contracted Eurocar rental in Cyprus.
Faults noticed on acceptance (well shrugged shoulders and "not a problem" comments from the local agent)
- Nearly every panel including the roof had dents or scrapes (only the tailgate seemed to have survived it's short life to date without incident)
- Radio didn't work due to a lack of an aerial on the roof (I didn't spot that on collection)
- Hazard light switch had a mind of it's own and popped out on a regular basis (I sorted this by wedging it in with some match sticks)
- At acceptance 119,000 km's (this is a personal record for me having never had a hire car with this sort of mileage on it)
- performance was best described as mediocre (probably due in no small part to the mileage)
- The gear leaver trim was broken and as a result road noise was far more than I would expect.
- The central locking was a bit hit and miss and you needed to make sure that it was locked physically before walking away
Current offer from easyCar customer services is £15 of the next rental to be taken in the next 6 months - but that was their opening one!!
Having a house in North west Spain we have hired loads of cars in the last 5 years. Recently we have insured the excess with insurance4carhire.com which has reasonable annual premiums, at least for me.
I would not recommend an insurer until the claims procedure has been tried. This we had to do for the first time in May. I hit and scraped the sill on the passenger side with a rock hidden in the grass, whilst turning round in a narrow driveway. Bearing in mind that it caused front and rear door plus sill damage this would have been expensive to repair.
Claims response was excellent with full recovery of the 500 Euro excess.
Don't forget if you pay the extra insurance to cover your excess directly to the hire company you are not liable for any disputed bang or dints already there and don't have to worry about the cars condition on return.
And yes the car was hired via Holiday Autos from Europcar!
I would not recommend an insurer until the claims procedure has been tried. This we had to do for the first time in May. I hit and scraped the sill on the passenger side with a rock hidden in the grass, whilst turning round in a narrow driveway. Bearing in mind that it caused front and rear door plus sill damage this would have been expensive to repair.
Claims response was excellent with full recovery of the 500 Euro excess.
Don't forget if you pay the extra insurance to cover your excess directly to the hire company you are not liable for any disputed bang or dints already there and don't have to worry about the cars condition on return.
And yes the car was hired via Holiday Autos from Europcar!
Edited by norasport on Monday 2nd July 13:38
A few years ago I had a part time job working with Hertz, to supplement my wages.
The drivers/valeters they employed in the depot I worked at were mainly
older people topping up their pension, and a few younger ones getting a bit of cash together for uni.
I was told that every car that went out on hire, had to have a damage inspection sheet with it, along with the hire agreement. A lot of the damage was caused by the older driver/valeters when they collected the vehicles(most of the vehicles we rented/hired went to the MOD and were delivered and collected from their sites), this would then be charged to the last hirer i.e the MOD.
The filling out of the forms was pretty farcical as well, If you took too long inspecting the vehicles it went against you, (you got a lot of the crappy jobs to do), hence the damage forms were'nt filled out properly, if at all.
If there isn't a signature at the bottom of the damage inspection sheet, I would seriously check the vehicle over very carefully before you go anywhere. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!
The drivers/valeters they employed in the depot I worked at were mainly
older people topping up their pension, and a few younger ones getting a bit of cash together for uni.
I was told that every car that went out on hire, had to have a damage inspection sheet with it, along with the hire agreement. A lot of the damage was caused by the older driver/valeters when they collected the vehicles(most of the vehicles we rented/hired went to the MOD and were delivered and collected from their sites), this would then be charged to the last hirer i.e the MOD.
The filling out of the forms was pretty farcical as well, If you took too long inspecting the vehicles it went against you, (you got a lot of the crappy jobs to do), hence the damage forms were'nt filled out properly, if at all.
If there isn't a signature at the bottom of the damage inspection sheet, I would seriously check the vehicle over very carefully before you go anywhere. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!
Edited by Mighty Mini on Monday 2nd July 16:35
Thanks for the support everyone, we are currently going through the mill with Europecar, who still have not come up with the requested bill for the damage so that we can see what we have been ripped off for.
Thanks for the advice Topfueldrag, we will try that insurance company, nice mustang by the way.
I am hoping to further smear Europcars name by trying to get the story mentioned on BBC Top Gear, that'll upset them. I am aslo going to regularly email Europcar to tell them the amount of people who I have told them about and how much business I have lost them. Please feel free to join in the barrage of emails to Europcar, I will give you the email of the relevant person to email so that you can tell them that you went with another car hire company instead of them, does that sound like a good idea? I think these hire companies have to learn not to dick about with people, or we will bite back!
Thanks for the advice Topfueldrag, we will try that insurance company, nice mustang by the way.
I am hoping to further smear Europcars name by trying to get the story mentioned on BBC Top Gear, that'll upset them. I am aslo going to regularly email Europcar to tell them the amount of people who I have told them about and how much business I have lost them. Please feel free to join in the barrage of emails to Europcar, I will give you the email of the relevant person to email so that you can tell them that you went with another car hire company instead of them, does that sound like a good idea? I think these hire companies have to learn not to dick about with people, or we will bite back!
Last weekend I hired a 118 beemer from Cologne airport. As usual it said no damage on the form. Your expected to sign the form 1/4 of a mile from the car... What peeved me off is I asked for a Focus with satnav. I am well aware they charge 20 euro for this but instead I got a 118 with built in sat-nav. So they still charged me for it. Ok I thought at least it has it. Get in the car, and ...... its all in German. Now Ive never used BMW I drive or whatever it is and didnt get to do German at school (because I hated French so I couldnt do German) but no matter what I tried I couldnt find english. So after 20 minutes I figured out how to use it and all was ok. Though saying that I noticed a scratch on the bumper when I returned the car so may have to wait and see if they try it on......
I think that it might depend which branch you go to.
I had the misfortune of having to go to Faro last year and I hired a car from Europcar. A foot long crack appeared in the windscreen after a couple of days and when I returned it after the week they initially were going to charge for a new 'screen. Fortunately one of the girls in the office remembered there being a small "star" chip on the screen that had obviously gotten bigger and they didn;t charge me anything, when they could have as I didn't sign the 'screen as damaged.
Moral is, don't just check the body work, but also check the windscreen.
I had the misfortune of having to go to Faro last year and I hired a car from Europcar. A foot long crack appeared in the windscreen after a couple of days and when I returned it after the week they initially were going to charge for a new 'screen. Fortunately one of the girls in the office remembered there being a small "star" chip on the screen that had obviously gotten bigger and they didn;t charge me anything, when they could have as I didn't sign the 'screen as damaged.
Moral is, don't just check the body work, but also check the windscreen.
We hired a car from Europcar in PISA.
I checked the car over before I left and conveniently they'd missed off some damgage. I pointed it out to the guy and made sure he added it. I also noticed the tank wasnt full so pointed that out too and he scribbled it down.
When I returned the car with more petrol in than when i took it out I was told everthing was ok and went on my way.
To my surprise I got home to find they'd taken 60 euros from my account. I questioned this with Europcar and Holiday Autos and received nothing for 2 weeks so started sending emails daily in ab id to get someones attention. Finally I received a breakdown through the post and found i'd been billed for fuel, a refuelling charge, an extra day and some insurances that I said I didnt want.
Eventually I received all my money back barring the refuelling charge and the fuel. As i dont know Italian I dont know what he wrote on the checkpout form when I mentioned the fuel so i dropped that part of it.
They made something up about getting the vouchers mixed up but it just goes to show if they can get away with it they'll try it on. Some people wouldnt be as pushy as I was.
I checked the car over before I left and conveniently they'd missed off some damgage. I pointed it out to the guy and made sure he added it. I also noticed the tank wasnt full so pointed that out too and he scribbled it down.
When I returned the car with more petrol in than when i took it out I was told everthing was ok and went on my way.
To my surprise I got home to find they'd taken 60 euros from my account. I questioned this with Europcar and Holiday Autos and received nothing for 2 weeks so started sending emails daily in ab id to get someones attention. Finally I received a breakdown through the post and found i'd been billed for fuel, a refuelling charge, an extra day and some insurances that I said I didnt want.
Eventually I received all my money back barring the refuelling charge and the fuel. As i dont know Italian I dont know what he wrote on the checkpout form when I mentioned the fuel so i dropped that part of it.
They made something up about getting the vouchers mixed up but it just goes to show if they can get away with it they'll try it on. Some people wouldnt be as pushy as I was.
Looks like Europcar have seen the error of their ways since my bank were let loose on them, Thanks HSBC, I will try to find out why their sudden change of heart after being so absolutely sure, with a cherry on top, why we were at fault in destroying their badly maintained clutch after only 10 Km on an autopista! I'll keep you all posted.
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