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My son has been caught out in what appears to be a very common scam by (but not limited to) Budget Rent a Car.
Car booked and paid for fully online. Additional amount paid online to upgrade the coverage and include break down cover. Only charge he should have had at pick up (in down town New York) was the refundable deposit.
He was asked if he wanted tolls added, which he declined, as he preferred to pay them as he went (he was driving to Chicago). He did in fact pay all tolls except for one in cash, the other he (fortunately) paid by card.
He signed the paperwork, and I’m sure you can guess where this is going. They had added on tolls and also something called Roadside Safety Network in spite of him declining all add ons. He is dyslexic, so not brilliant at reading stuff through, and has signed not realising they’ve add this stuff on. He has then been charged approx £75 for tolls and the RSN in spite of paying all tolls as he went. I’ve not been able to speak to him in detail to see whether he even noticed the charge on there or not, but if there was a figure written he would have quite possibly just assumed it was for the refundable deposit.
He has contacted them through FB messenger and explained the situation. They’ve said they’ll contact the branch to get a copy of the paperwork which will obviously show his signature.
From reading around, this seems to be a common scam. Jut wondering if anyone had experienced similar, and if so, what they did? Assuming he gets nowhere with the resolution team on messenger (which I don’t think he will) what would be your next port of call? Complaint to CEO, or just go straight to credit card? He can show he was fully covered including breakdown, and can also show one of the toll payments on his card, so had no need for either of the additions they fraudulently stuck on.
And for anyone reading who says let him sort it, I’m just trying to help him out. He’s currently driving Route 66, so not in the same place twice, and has limited signal. And his dyslexia is a massive issue, so I try and help him out as much as possible with admin stuff, as it often causes problems.
You’d think one of the major international car hire firms would realise if they could a reputation for being fair and above board, they’d gain a huge competitive advantage. Renting a car is like playing franchise roulette.
Not sure what help the credit card company will be, as the evidence appears stacked in the favour of the hire car firm. So I’d suggest focussing your efforts on Budget. But others may have more experience / knowledge than I do.
Hope it’s not impacting on your son’s trip too much.
I was caught by this more than once in my early days. With Hertz in particular, more than once, and with Avis as well.
Later Budget tried this and a few other things on (like the take it with half full tank and we’ll reimburse it but you must bring it back full) a few times when I used to use them. But by then I knew enough to refuse.
The position will be that even if after a 13 hour flight a person, even a dyslexic one, landed exhausted at 11pm at night, on a prebook – or even sometimes prepaid! – and even after a specific discussion going through all the inclusions and non inclusions in the contract, if even after that they sign a document with the wrong boxes ticked or charges that were not agreed or even just a totally incorrect charge that is many times the amount agreed or even prepaid, if they sign that document they’re st*ffed. Yup, guess why I really know this.
That, for sure in UK or Europe. Even though if the specific conversation immedistely preceding and/or the actual booking agreed ahead were different, it’s legally misrepresentation so illegsl. But you can’t prove it.
Things can be fixed by calling customer services of the brand BUT only if what you got charged is different from the document you signed and you csn prove it. eg you can prove you filled it right before returning it, or location tries to make an early return charge that there’s nothing in the contract for. Then, the brand office will fix it if you call them.
IME airport locations are far more likely to pull these tricks routinely. In all companies. So be particularly careful if leaving or picking up at airport locations.
Car hire companies will say the actual contract is the one you sign at the desk and that ovdrrides anything preceding. Including the review conversation making sure the contract is correct, that you just had.
The car hire industry are ba$tard$ and the only thingbI can think of that are more uniformly fraudulent and dishonest, is estate agents.
Expect fraud at every moment snd check. Particularly the document you sign no matter what the presures on you, and particularky the condition of the vehicle inside and out, and the presence or absence of accessories/ handbook, fuel level etc (photographing, ideally) on pickup and on returning the vehicle. And never, ever, if you can possibly avoid it, drop a vehicle without having the hire co check it and sign for it as no damage, all there, full tank before you leave the car there (so key drops to be avoided whetever possible).
This, after decades of car hire. Not sure about the US as I’ve always headed off attempts there but think he’s SOL there too.
@LadyLondon I did try to drill it into him, as I don’t trust any car rental companies at all. But unfortunately, a great block of text from mum proves to be a bit of a problem, so I think he just plucks out of it the things he can instantly read, and doesn’t always persevere with everything else. Plus he still thinks I’m a mum nag, even though trying to help!
He did read the bit about taking photos/videos of the car on pick up and drop off, including photos of the fuel gauge when he dropped it off, and also kept the receipt for filling up with fuel.
@ed-fly thanks. It’s an annoyance for him, he isn’t made of money, but he’ll get over it! I’d really like to try and help him get it back though, as they’ve been so underhanded about it. I get that he has signed the paperwork, and this is what they’ll say, but I’m really hoping that copies of the messages he has sent to Budget to try and resolve it, plus his original booking paperwork showing he already has breakdown cover and the fact he paid a toll on his card would show that he had no need for either of those things to be added. We’ll see.
I’m still in a few Orlando/Disney FB groups from years ago, and seems a very common thing to happen there. This wasn’t an airport pick up or drop off so thought it might be less likely to be a problem, but it seems not. People on those groups seem to have had success when they’ve contacted the CEO of the company though, so I guess if customer services don’t come back with a positive result, I’ll try that. Nothing to lose.
You could bring out the dyslexic angle (a disability) if you make further contact as being the reason you helped him do the booking correctly and also why he needed to rely on the conversation he presumably had and the documents he was asked to sign being correct. Also if he is still young might help to mention age.
I don’t understand add this FB messenger stuff.
A simple old fashioned email to customer.service@budget.co.uk stating the RA number and the fact that an excess charge has appeared on a fully prepaid rental. Ask them to explain specifically what it relates to, and why it was added after drop off without authorisation.
That got mine removed in around 7 days with Avis, same company behind the scenes.
A couple of years back I had some issues with an avis rental. I sent a letter by recorded delivery to the uk CEO, never heard back, haven’t used Avis since.
Agree with lady London advice, make reference to the dyslexia. Keep it relatively short (in retrospect my complaint was too long). Fingers crossed you’ll get a positive outcome.
Second all the above, and good luck! I would never decline to help my own son, who has similar issues, no matter how old he was (hell, I even had to show my OH how to re-route himself home from France last month when our separate bookings were cancelled 🤣).
We picked up a rental car at Avis OPO earlier this week, and what was supposed to be a “full” tank was actually 3/4. OH was not pleased but I bet they’ll just charge us at their insane rates if we don’t return it full.
Also, we have a gadget fitted for the toll roads, but it only worked in Portugal and we’ve had to pay separately in Spain. I’m now wondering if we’re going to get charged a 2nd time!
I don’t understand add this FB messenger stuff.
A simple old fashioned email to customer.service@budget.co.uk stating the RA number and the fact that an excess charge has appeared on a fully prepaid rental. Ask them to explain specifically what it relates to, and why it was added after drop off without authorisation.
That got mine removed in around 7 days with Avis, same company behind the scenes.
It was added on at pick up. They went through the booking, then did a print out and asked him to sign. Unfortunately he did, for reasons listed above. My son only picked it up because he thought that the refundable deposit had been put through on his card as 2 transactions of $100 each (and he was expecting to pay $200 deposit). However, one of the amounts went to a cleared transaction, whilst the other stayed as pending. He queried it with Budget (I did first, but they wouldn’t speak to me) and he was told it was for the RSN and tolls that he had requested be added!
He then sent me a photograph of the signed paperwork he had kept, and they had indeed snuck it on there, even though he’d said no. He then sent another message through to Budget (drafted by me) saying that he had said no when offered it, and was told they were going to get the paperwork from the branch which would take 5-7 days. He hasn’t bothered replying to that, as obviously he already has his copy, so will just wait to see what they say.
I went with FB messenger because when I was searching for similar issues, lots of comments on their FB page came up, so it was easiest just to go from there. The email address you used is obviously a uk email address, was your rental you had issues with for here or abroad?
So, having been through FB messenger, the UK customer service email provided on the invoice sent through the post, and finally the CEO email, my son has had half the charges refunded.
I gave the customer service email address 2 weeks to reply before contacting the CEO and heard nothing back other than the automated email giving a case number.
All in all, very frustrating, but I think that half back is probably the best we can hope for given that ultimately (unfortunately) he did sign the paperwork.
Anyway, will definitely be giving Budget a swerve. His follow on car hire was with Dollar, where he did 3000 miles along Route 66 and then to San Francisco, and they didn’t try any of that rubbish on him, and no extra charges.
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