Avis - International Rentals

Car rental confirmation number **. Done with Travelocity. Reservation was to pick up car at 10 am. The day before leaving to Mendoza, Argentina, I called the customer service number of Avis and let them know that I will be arriving to the airport at 7 pm. They said it's ok and guarantee the car. When I arrived they did not have any car available, and their employees treat me like a street dog, laughed at me and said, "Leave, this is not my problem!" I did not have a car to mobilize for 6 days in a foreign country. I had to pay transportation for more than the equivalent of $750 in the national currency and we could not go to the places we had planed to. My family and I had a disaster as a vacation due to not have ways to move.

I have twice used or tried to use Avis Thailand for car rental, and both times ended in frustration. The first time, only an economy car was presented, when in fact, I ordered a larger compact. There were too many other resulting problems, and an indifferent management. The second time was in Chiang Mai in September, when they charged me an additional fee for my partner to drive as well. I cancelled on the spot and went immediately to Hertz. Definitely a better experience.

I will never hire from Avis Thailand again! Despite my requests for return calls or explanation, all were ignored. I note that Budget Thailand also allows free driving for spouse or partner, so Avis still has a lot to learn.

We rented a car on the Avis online site. It was for pick up in Caen, France, and to be dropped off at the train station in Orleans, France. As the Avis location closes at noon on Saturday, we were told to leave the car in the train station parking garage, and to leave the keys with the train station information booth. We returned the car at about 5:00 PM on the date that we were supposed to. We parked the car in the garage and gave the key to the man in the information booth at the train station. We told him the row where the car was parked in the parking garage. On Monday, while in Paris, I received a call from Avis wanting to know where the car was located. I returned the call; advised them of the location of the car, and confirmed that they had gotten the keys to the car.

When I rented the car, the quote was for $219.61. When I got my credit card statement, I had been charged $830.64. The additional charges were for one week rental on the car, $150.00 in parking fines and for other items that we did not receive. I disputed the charge. Capital One provided them with evidence, where we had purchased train tickets to Paris from Orleans when we dropped off the car, charges that we had made in Paris on the return date and subsequently that week and evidence that I had called Avis to tell them, again, where the car was located. Capital One said they could not do anything as we did not have the final receipt. Of course, there was no one to return the car to, and get a receipt. This is a total rip off. They know that there is nothing you can do about it in the U.S.

Returned to Scotland only to find that Avis had managed to squeeze an extra 20.9litres in and charged me 32.40 euro on my credit card. I have e mailed Avis to complain but have yet to hear anything from them.

I am now firmly convinced that Avis France is diliberately taking advantage of people who don't speak and read French, and tricking them into buying services that they don't want. I am still pursuing this, but unless I find the corporate headquarter of Avis of France, or their parent company, Avis France is going to laugh all the way to the bank.

I am most surprised for the following reasons:

3) How is it possible that these two facts seem to be considered as NORMAL by the man representing AVIS in Leuven, Belgium?

My lawyer even suggested an additional amount of money for the fact that he was given an unsafe car. I look forward to hearing from you, hoping that on the international level your reputation will be more customer friendly.

I rented a car through a Travel Agent (Thomas Cook) to go along with airline tickets I bought for a vaction in Spain. I flew into Alicante airport and picked up the car as planned. I proceeded on to my holiday destination staying the seven days that I had scheduled. Upon my return, I drove to the airport and took the car to the lot marked "AVIS" and went to the kiosk where I thought I would find someone to give the keys to. There was no one there.

I then went into the airport and proceeded to the desk where I originally picked the keys up. I explained to them that there was no one at the lot to "check-in" the vehicle with. I told them the mileage and that the tank was full of fuel as I had just filled it up. The lady said ok... I flew back to England and within three days I got a notice from AVIS saying that they were taking $275 off of my credit card for damage/repairs. There was nothing wrong with the car when I dropped it off. I talked to the travel agent. They said they would get back to me and I heard nothing.

I went to the AVIS UK website (I am in the USAF stationed in England) and filled in a complaint block and I heard nothing. I did the same on the American site and still have heard nothing. It seems they are just hoping that I will go away. Is there any recourse that I have or can they just take money as they like from my credit card. My point is that there was no one there to inspect the car and tell me what was wrong and when they said in their notice that something was wrong they did not say what.

My husband and I reserved a car at www.avis.com for a 12-day rental, with a quoted price of $291.00 USD. We picked up the car at Bolzano on June 3, 2002. When asked about any additional insurances that we might want, we reassured the clerk that we wanted no additional insurances at all. After some arguing, he agreed and then circled three areas of a form for us to sign in order to waive our desire for coverage. I noticed that the form was entirely in Italian, which I thought was odd for an American company dealing with a reservation made from the United States, but trusted the clerk and put my initials in the circles.

On returning the car twelve days later, the clerk thanked us for the keys and wished us a good day. I asked for a final copy of the bill, and he looked surprised. Let me just say now that I am astounded that an itemized final bill, requiring a signature, is not a mandatory part of doing business with Avis. That has never been my experience with any of my car rentals in the United States. The clerk eventually printed up a copy of bill which is barely legible and includes no headings or labels.

In particular, there is no label for Total Amount or Final Cost. However, I looked at the number at the bottom and saw that it read 815.40. I asked the clerk if that was our final total and he said that it was. I asked the clerk why the amount was so high, since our reservation had clearly stated the cost would only be $291.00. The clerk asked if the quote had been in Euros or dollars, and when I replied that it was in dollars he said that the final price was in Euros and obviously that was responsible for the discrepancy.

I began to get angry, with good reason. I explained, as calmly as possible, that the exchange rate was $0.95 to 1.00 Euro, and that his argument was ridiculous. Then I asked again about the discrepancy. At this point the clerk pointed to the circled initials made twelve days ago (when we were told we were waiving any additional charges) and said those represented mandatory insurances which everyone had to accept. We argued this point for the next few minutes, but the clerks point was very clear the charges represented insurance, and he regarded them as mandatory. At one point he even said that the charges had been automatically added by the computer and that he had no control over them.

I asked the clerk his name, he pointed to the name on the form (Rapezzi Giordano) and then my husband and I left. My charges of fraud are as follows:

1. Our quote says that certain charges (i.e. additional insurances, waivers, etc) are optional, but we were told by the Italian clerk that they were mandatory.

2. We were told at rental time that we were signing away our need for additional insurance (on a non-English form) and were then told when returning the car that we had actually signed a form accepting these insurances instead.

3. We were not told about any additional charges at rental time.

4. We were lied to by the Avis clerk regarding the reason for cost discrepancies (i.e. when he tried to blame it on currency conversion.)

5. We were not given a clearly understandable final bill. 6. We were never asked to sign any statement of final charges. In fact, the only form with any signatures on it (attachment #2) carries only my initials, and the Amount Due area is conspicuously blank, as are any signature lines.

We have never had any problems with Avis rentals prior to this past experience (during our honeymoon, no less), nor have we heard anything but praises for Avis in general. I can only assume that this behavior was the result of a mistake made by an errant clerk, and sincerely hope that this bad experience will soon be put right. We will obviously be glad to pay the original quoted price of $291.00, plus any small fees required in adding a second driver onto our rental agreement. However, the amount actually charged to our credit card is: $794.87.

Aside from the obvious consequence of an $800 charge on our credit card, which we can ill afford now that we are trying to pay off our wedding expenses, this experience also resulted in our ending our three-week honeymoon on a very bitter note.

Since I became overdrawn by this transaction, it left me with unauthorised overdraft charges and no spending money for my following holiday in France, I had a miserable holiday due to this and am still struggling until my next payday.