Rentalcars.comReviews 1,137

I had a recent experience with Rentalcars.com. I had booked a car for 4 days in Venice (Marco Polo Airport) to be picked up at 12 noon. My flight got delayed a few hours and I arrived at 4pm for my pre-paid car. The rental car company had given away my car and was told they had no cars left. They told me to contact Rentalcars.com for my refund as they did not receive any payment. I contacted Rentalcars.com and was told that since I arrived after 2 hours of my scheduled time, I forfeit my payment of $200 AND they cannot help me get another car. They said that the 2 hour deal was part of they 'terms and conditions' - the long agreements they expect me to read. I did read the confirmation email and rental fees/excess information they provided which doesn't mention any 2 hour rule.

I was stranded in Venice airport, without a car for my road trip. Most other car rentals were also sold out. The ones that remained where charging me 550 Euro ($800 CAD) since it was their last full-size car, for 4 days. Not to mention, I'm out $200 from Rentalcars.com.

I called Rentalcars.com, who said that they were sorry to hear my flight got delayed for a few hours but they cannot refund my money. I forfeit my entire rental amount as I arrived 4 hours late for my PRE-PAID car, which I expected to be there - I already paid for it! They don't have a right to rent it to somebody else and charge me and them (double). Not to mention now I have another $800+ amount I have to pay out of pocket to rent a car for my euro trip.

The worst site and service I have ever come across.

ADVICE - Always book directly through the rental car sites as they will hold your prepaid car for at least 24 hours. Do not try and save $20 and loose your rental when you arrive and forfeit the entire amount prepaid for the rental itself.

I wrote to rental cars several times and received no help:

Hi Alex
Thanks for coming back to me.
I don't agree that it's the customers responsibility to ask for an explanation of charges except in the instance where the agent has already proactively explained the charges through verbal explanation and pointing on where in the document these charges are hidden.

I reiterate:
1. The agent added on charges which I did not request
2. The agent did not verbally explain the charges
3. The agent did not point out where in the paperwork the charges were hidden
4. The agent rushed me (impatiently) to sign the document

By taking this approach, rentalcars are not protecting their customers and are contributing to the poor ethics this industry has.

It is the agent's responsibility to ensure the customer has understood the t&cs and this did not happen, irrespective of my signature.

This is exactly the same as all the customers (including me) that signed for PPI without it being requested or being explained and look what happened next.

Further when you take a loan or a mortgage, it is also the responsibility of the advisor to ensure the customer is verbally and contractually clear BEFORE they are asked to sign the document (re Key Facts document under FCA).

I again request a refund of these unauthorised charges which have been taken from my credit card under protest and that have been levied upon me.

Can you honest say that you'd be happy if you were conned in this way and the retailing organisation hid behind "well, you signed the document". It's a cop out which continues to bring the industry into disrepute.

If I don't get suitable recompense from rentalcars then I'll be initiating a section 75 complaint to initiate a chargeback and escalating the complaint further.

1 star for this company is too much. Unbelievable scam. Make sure the person who you check as the main driver is the person who is the bearer of the credit card you pay with. Otherwise the unfriendly staff, sick of this problem repeating constantly and having nothing to do with it, will refuse to even try to help you out. But rentalcars charge it anyways. No such problem at the very next counter. At rentalcars in Manchester, nobody is answering the phone, Gareth, the on-line chat agent, did not discuss the problem at all. Stay away, warn your friends!

Good website to compare price and book optimal you, the problem is that the company do not take any responsibility, I booked the car from Gold car by rentalcars.com, terms of rent were, return car with a full tank or empty, I returned with full, the company did not return to me 80 euros that were withdrawn from my card, at beginning, I applied to the company rentalcars, first time they ask to fill complains again, then send them a copy of charge, then they ask to send strange document from my bank, that my bank confirm I didnt receive money back, All it Instead to send request to the Goldcar and getting a confirmation of the return charge and resolve this issue, in general rentalcars do all that I just forgot about it issue. Awful service!

I rented a car with them, they charged me the car rental and basic insurance before pick the car up at Budget ($300 US). When I picked up the car at Budget they told me I needed to pay for an extra insurance to cross the border from Mexico to US. They were unable to charge just the insurance and charged me again the car rental together the insurance ($400.00) and told me rentalcars would refund me the $300. This never happened! Rentalcars and Budget charged me twice and didn't give me my money back after 2 months of "investigation"

DO NOT RENT FROM THEM

I paid fully for a car, and when I got to my destination, there was no car. I made a call immediately to rentalcars.com to inform them and was assured the procedure for refund is simple. They will contact the rental company to confirm no car was taken, then a refund will be given to me. 7 days that was what I was given. When I got no answer in 7 days, then they said 21 days. Apparently the rental company did not reply their request for confirmation that a car was not taken and it has been 2 months now.

After chasing up with many emails and live chats, I got an email from a person called Natasha who gave me a long story about how she hasn't got a reply and she made a call to the rental company and whoever picked up the call said there was another contract under my name or whatever rubbish and she thinks that i picked up the car... it was all such bull and at the end of the day it seems like they are not going to give me my refund

I lost $600 for a car I didn't get and a lot of hours talking to a bunch of rentalcars.com staff who work for a company that is not interested in giving me my refund.

Don't rent from them. Go directly to the car rental company. That will save you the risk of these nonsense and losing money like I did.

L

I was promised to get my money back after 7 working days and it has been over 21 days now I was not even able to take the car. I waited for 3 hours in the airport trying to get the car and terrible experience having the problem being thrown at a from Avis and from Rentalcars employee. We then tried switching to sixt and it was even a terrible idea because of technical issues from their employee with excuses that she is unable to access the system. I will not leave this case until they will claim my full amount into my account. Terrible experience and would not recommend anyone to book with them.

I booked a car for a 10 day trip to UK I paid $166.84 up front, the car was not available when I got to Europcar at Manchester Airport. This seems to be the bait and switch situation, The cheapest car they could give me was 40GBP a day and the whole rental came to just over $1000 with all the other charges, nowhere on my final bill was any deduction for the $166.84 that I had paid up front, Rentalcars.com wont reply to my emails, just stay away

I mistakenly booked for a pickup at my destination at 1am on August 18th instead of August 19th. When I tried to change my 2-week car reservation a few days later for a pick up at the correct time on the 19th, the rentalcars.com website forced me to rebook my entire reservation for an ADDITIONAL COST of nearly $200. As I couldn't believe that rentalcars.com would be expecting that I book a car rental for one less day for a HEFTY ADDITIONAL COST, I went ahead and called rentalcars.com to address the problem directly. What I received from their rep was a bunch of crap advising me that I would need to rebook at the higher cost... despite the fact that I would have been willing to pay the same original costs while picking up the vehicle a day later (i. E., same rent payment for one less day!). This is no way to treat customers...

We had a very bad experience with this company. We wanted to rent a car in Bukarest Rumania. First we had to wait for them 30min in the arrival hall of the airport followed by another hour waiting at the counter. This company is runned by young very unprofessional juniors who looks like started the company just recently. At the end they told us they don't have a car for us at all as we have no reservation! They also handled the problem very unprofessional and didn't offer us any ride back to the airport nor any other help. It was a lesson again to rent a car only at one of the bigger companys.

I received my important info email with details about the rental 3 weeks AFTER I fetched the car, the service provider (Interrent) didn't have a polo or similar car, they only had a fiat 500 which couldn't fit our bags, we were forced to upgrade the vehicle at a very large cost and then taking advantage of the language barrier I later noticed they charged us daily for a child's seat when we didn't have one or need one... in future I will contact europecar directly and get what I pay for as in the past... terrible experience on the first day of your holiday

We booked and paid online, two months in advance, for a car in Florence-Italy, to pick up at 10 o'clock. We arrived on time, only to wait, with kids, for more than 1 hour and a half, on the street in a 38 degrees temperature, to get served! Horrible, dreadful experience. You can see the staff working soooo slowly right in front of all the waiting customers eyes, without even having the decency to hurry the pace a little! Plus it turns out their insurance is a scam!

We booked through rentalcars.com for a recent trip to California. Upon landing, we were told by the rental car company that they did not have a car for us. We immediately called rentalcars.com who told us to reserve a car with another company and they would reimburse us for the difference. Upset and tired from traveling, we had no other choice. We paid an additional $300 out of pocket to have a car for the week. Once we returned home, I sent in our receipt as we were instructed to do. We received an email from Natasha in Customer Service on July 19 to which we immediately replied. It is now August 4 and we have had ZERO communication from rentalcars.com. I have emailed them several times with NO response - not even an update on the status of our claim. Don't be fooled by the low prices, as the saying goes, you get what you pay for! I assume we will be out the $300 because of their mistake. Shame on us for trusting that they would take care of us. Never using rentalcars.com again. Oh, and we racked up $120 in international phone call charges since they are based in the UK. So really I am out $400 because we chose to book through them - never again!

Watch out! Second time I am fooled by this company. It only happened to me in Warsaw's Modlin airport (WMI). They get you to sign that the tank is full. When you get in the car the tank might be 90%. If you return it full and you say it, they'll tell you that you should have returned it in the same condition. If you return it 90%full, they'll say you have signed that it was full! I've just had this experience in Modlin. It might just be bad luck with the staff, but whatch out, they are dishonest.

I booked a car months before in New York. They told me to pick up the car on 2 Spruce street at a Hertz store in Manhattan. But when we got there, there is no Hertz store at all! It took us hours to reach the agent and the funny thing is that they still insisted there is one store there even I said I had confirmed with Hertz. Stupid! Anyway, my travel trip was ruined and I wasted hundreds of money. Never recommend this stupid company! I can't believe this is from Priceline!