Hello Travelers, In June we are headed to England for the first time. We plan to take a train to Bath and after a few days there rent an automatic transmission car for the rest of our trip. We used Auto Europe for a trip to Germany and liked the fact that we could rent an inexpensive GPS system that they sent to us at home before we left. Has anyone used Auto Europe for car rentals in Bath? When I did a search for our dates the companies they showed in Bath were Europcar and Hertz. I'd sure appreciate hearing how that worked out for anyone who has rented from them. If you reserved an automatic transmission, did they actually have an automatic when you went to pick up the car? Any hassles with Auto Europe, Europcar or Hertz? Any great experiences? Has anyone used Auto Europe's GPS in England? Thanks so much!
Posted by
11608 posts
In over 30 years renting from AutoEurope we have never had one problem, no matter what car company was booked.
Automatic rentals are easier to get at airports, large cities. Don’t know about Bath as we picked up our car in Bristol.
Posted by
Georgetown,KY
145 posts
In 2017, we brought our GPS, with the Portugal software added and used google maps on my phone for backup. After numerous glitches (and wasted time), we only used google maps on my phone in Ireland for 2018.
Posted by
Alexandria, VA
771 posts
In 2017, we did what you are planning, spent a few days in Bath after London, then rented a car for the rest of our trip through Great Britain. We rented through Auto Europe and used Hertz. We took a taxi to get to the rental office because it was a bit out of the way. We usually go for a manual transmission, and I get a SIM card for my iPad for navigation with Google Maps, but they had an automatic ready for us with a built in navigation system.
We headed from there to northern Wales, and I found that the navigation system and Google Maps didn’t always agree, but we got where we wanted to go. We traveled on through England and Scotland and had no problems.
Posted by
Calgary, Alberta, Canada
4625 posts
In September, we used Enterprise to rent an automatic car in Bath and then dropped it off at Gatwick a few days later. Enterprise has a pick-up service if you call a day ahead to arrange. Service was excellent. Our car came with built-in GPS at no charge, but I don't know if that is standard on all vehicles; we had rented a Nissan Qashqai, I believe in the US it is known as the Rogue Sport. England is the only place so far that we've driven in Europe. One quirk we were advised on by Enterprise is not to plug in the address but the Postal Code (Zipcode). Apparently addresses sometimes will confuse the GPS in England. We lucked out because I have a Tom Tom that I had brought but it does not give me the option of searching by postal codes. Out of curiosity, I used both the Tom Tom and the car's navigation for a couple of destinations and the postal code method was much more reliable.
Posted by
Portsmouth
5554 posts
Beware the policy of Hertz when it comes to Sat Nav. If the vehicle has built in Sat Nav (which is becoming frequently more common) but the map data is held on a removable sim card then the policy with Hertz is to remove it and charge an exorbitant rental fee (same as their stand alonde Sat Navs) to replace it. Some vehicles have the map data built in so Hertz are unable to do anything about it. i've experienced this in the US, UK, Spain and France but I've never experienced it with any other rental company.