We recently returned a Europcar to the Pisa Airport and found the agent running her hand alongside the car panels in order to discover a barely noticeable 2cm dent that you could see only by standing at a certain angle. The dent was so tiny and shallow to be easily overlooked on pick-up and we did not include it with the pre existing damage such as the major scrape on the other side of the vehicle. Be aware that if you do not spend a lot of time inspecting and noting the most insignificant flaw on your car at pickup (make sure you run your hands over every square inch!) Europcar will charge you an extra €300 thanks to their highly trained inspectors!
Posted by
Huntsville, AL, USA
8120 posts
Better yet. Take before and after pictures.
Posted by
180 posts
what's he's saying is a dent like that wouldn't show up in photos, so taking pics wouldn't do any good
Posted by
752 posts
Travel yes,
Sorry to hear of your experience. Thanks for reminding us to be careful with the inspections. Did you have any collision /damage insurance through Europcar or your credit card; or was this amount not covered because of a deductible?
Posted by
SF Bay Area
303 posts
My husband calls Europcar "Stalincar" and refuses to rent from them anymore after some horrible experiences.
Although with a different company on a recent business trip to the UK my husband got dinged (ha) £500 for a microscopic scratch (luckily his employer will pay most of that). I appreciate the advice about taking pictures, but these (like the OP's) were tiny scratches and you'd have to photograph every square centimeter, and even then ... we are talking very subtle marks. Sigh. It seems to always happen when returning a car to the airport – they assume you're about to catch a plane. This time he was just heading for a hotel at Heathrow so he was not in a hurry ...
Posted by
Houston
3516 posts
They were well aware of that damage. Training was teaching them to look "surprised" that they "found" new damage. Every renter who did not take out their zero deductible insurance coverage has paid for it and will continue to pay for it until they replace the car.
Posted by
Knoxville, TN, USA
7209 posts
Better yet just stick to the trains.
Posted by
Portland
3590 posts
I always use my amex premium rental car insurance, except in Italy, where they don’t cover. There’s no deductible; and it’s very cheap, around $25 for the entire rental period, up to 42 days. My suspicion is that the rental companies don’t try to put over their inflated repair bills on amex. If you take the insurance from the rental company, they have every incentive to run the repair estimate up to the deductible limit.
Just an observation: the rental car business seems to attract an overabundance of people with little or no integrity. Sigh.
Posted by
New York, NY, USA
11294 posts
"My suspicion is that the rental companies don’t try to put over their inflated repair bills on amex"
My friend's experience in Hawaii was that they indeed do try to pull the inflated repair bills, but Amex is very successful in fighting them, in a way that a single renter never can be. He was very grateful to have Amex fighting for him in this situation.
The OP's story is why I insisted on zero deductible coverage when I rented (with this same friend) in Italy.