A LoyaltyLobby reader sent us a case about a Europcar location in Sydney that had tried to charge them for damage someone else had previously caused after a return inspection.
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You can access Europcar here.
Reader’s Case:
The local office was eventually going to charge me, at which point I escalated my case the Europcar Group head office which settled the case in a few hours. This is not a path your readers could or should have to follow and therefore I wish you could warn them by publishing my story.
The problems we encountered:
– They changed the contract price of the prepaid reservation after signing the contract (from all-in price, to excluding VAT). And charged the card with VAT 2 hours later.
– We waited 1 hour in line (severely understaffed & no priority line for high status customers)
– We booked a fully charged electric car, but no single car was available.
– The car assigned in the contract, was not the car we actually received.
– We did not receive the rental agreement – including a damage overview – for the car we received.
– Upon returning, we were ensured ‘all was okay – no new damages & full tank’. The confirmation e-mail would arrive soon.
– An hour later (most people would be in the lounge or boarding), we received an e-mail stating ’new damages’ were discovered. It encluded a photo with a small scratch (1 cm) and a 3 weeks old photo without damage. We only rented for 48 hours, so the ‘old’ photo has no value.
– We filmed the car upon pickup and the little scratch was already visible on the video. I sent the screenshot of the video to this Europcar location, as proof the damage was not caused by us.
– Europcar did not respond to the e-mail at all, but sent out another e-mail saying they would get an estimate of the repair costs and will charge me for that.
To me, the whole process smells and is not in line with what I encountered at Europcar before. Based on my experience and based on the Google reviews of this location, it seems the licensee does not take pride in doing fair business
No local agencies
To minimise the risk of being extorted money from fraudulent car rental companies, I steer clear of local agencies and mostly book directly with the biggest companies like Sixt, Hertz, Europcar etc. But while renting a car with Europcar Sydney last month, I encountered fraudulent practises that I want to warn other travellers for.
‘All is fine’
Despite holding elite status with Europcar and booking a prepaid electric car directly, no single car was available when turning up at the counter in the international terminal. Never mind there was no priority line and the wait was well over an hour. Between signing the agreement and eventually driving away in a car, I also received an ‘updated’ rental contract with a higher price I never signed for. Europcar took the liberty to increase the daily rental fee and automatically charged my card for it.
More disturbing was that the car I finally received, was not the fully charged electric car in the contract but a petrol car. A bit of a bummer, since electric cars should come with a full charge (no need to recharge) but petrol cars have to be returned full. Europcar did not provide me with a contract for this car, let alone an overview of existing damages. The guy said ‘all is fine’. Although I spent 2 hours waiting for this car, I still decided to film the outside of the car with my phone, which would later turn out to be a life saver.
‘Repair costs to be finalised’
Two days later, I returned the car and the employee assured me all was fine. No new damages. He did not want to sign it off, but he promised an e-mail was underway. As this is Australia, I took his words for it. But an hour later I received an e-mail, stating: “We found scratches on the front right hand corner on the car near the metal covering the grill. When we checked online at the previous pictures we found that it was new damage. We have attached the before and after photos at the end of the email. We need you to fill out the attached Incident Report Form and email it back to us.”
Europcar used a 17-days old photo to proof their point. But I only rented the car for 48 hours and so this photo does not prove that I caused the damage. I sent them a reply, including screenshots of my video showing the light damage was there already when I picked up the car. I thought an excuse e-mail would follow soon. But clearly nobody at Europcar Sydney was interested in my proof, as the following day later I received another e-mail. “We are currently awaiting our repair costs to be finalised, once available we will contact you via email. If the Damage Excess is payable, we will supply you with a tax invoice and provide 7 days notice before applying any charges.”
Unfair
At this point it became clear this business has no intention being fair. They changed the rental price without my consent, provided me with a different car then on the contract, did not provide an overview of existing damages/scratches, accused me of damaging the car without evidence and fully ignored my evidence that damage was there. Mind you, this is not a funky local car rental company in Southern Europe but a Europcar in Australia that apparently does not mind fooling their own elite members.
Based on my experience and the numerous lousy reviews this location gets online, maybe your readers want to consider other rental companies in Sydney. To give them the credit they deserve, my experience with National/Alamo in Australia was flawless.
UPDATE: Reader’s Escalation Process:
On the day I heard they were waiting for the estimate, I contacted HQ (executive.relations@europcar.
com). Within a day, it all was a mistake from the Sydney office and ‘feedback and further training’ would be offered….
Conclusion
I could swear that I had imaginary damage charged once in South Africa, but I have caused damage a handful of times and settled the cases (most recently, handing out cash to the guy who picked up the car).
It is remarkable that the reader took images of the car before they drove off so that they had photos that proved that they weren’t the ones who had caused the damage.
I find it highly susceptible that these damages are often “found” when you have already left the rental agency, and they don’t need to deal with the customer face to face. I prefer having a settled and closed rental contact before heading to the door, even if that takes some extra time.
Have you had trouble with car rental agencies? Please comment below.
