Car Rental at Heathrow SUCKS!

wrote in message
om...
"Errol" wrote

She didn't understand the impact that would have in the US. If her rental
operation was a franchise or agency then they would be under the gun from
her US head office. As I said, she phoned around to get support for not
giving me the car, but her management seemed to pass when she said "he's
got
paperwork", until a senior manager told her to comply. Errol

What was the company?
How much was the rate?
Had you managed to bppl some sort of special deal which
is not generally available and with which the operating
staff were not familiar?

Don't want to get into the details because I might get someone
fired. The rate was an internet special given by the company that
she worked for, not a 3rd party consolidator. It was a large and well-known
rental agency
headquartered in the US. The rate was a good one but still somewhat
higher than the US rates.

Errol

"Errol" wrote in message
...

Don't want to get into the details because I might get someone
fired. The rate was an internet special given by the company that
she worked for, not a 3rd party consolidator. It was a large and
well-known
rental agency
headquartered in the US. The rate was a good one but still somewhat
higher than the US rates.

On a point of interest. I'm hiring a car myself at the weekend. From
Newcastle (NCL) airport. Even tho I'm local to it and not flying there.

Weekend rate for a medium size car e.g. Ford Focus 1.6
Alamo - £123
National - £66

Which is interesting considering they are the same company with the same
staff and the same cars!

"Errol" wrote in message
...

So here's an example for January 10-11 Avis at Philly base rate is
$31.98 while for LHR it's 40 quid or $71. That's a significant difference
to
start with.
Also, remember that a lot of US people have insurance for their own
vehicles
which automatically covers them so they don't need the addtional.

UK insurance doesn't cover you for driving hire cars, or usually any car
rather than your own. Neither do credit cards provide coverage. I would
guess your US insurance wouldn't cover UK rental anyway.

So I say again, you need to compare the price inclusive of insurance. You
are comparing the USA base price which doesn't include insurance with the UK
price that does! It's not uncommon for US rental companies insurance to more
than double the base price. If you compare the real cost, inclusive of
everything, and excepting one off special deals, I doubt you would see much
difference at all, despite motoring being considerably more expensive in the
UK.

As I said, a report to the FTC and Better Business Bureau in the US will
make any corporate headquarters drop their coffee and run for the phones.
Once you have a franchise or agency you can also expect spot checks
of a covert nature. I know this because I was in franchise management.
I did spot checks on petrol/service stations as well.

This may well be so. But I would guess someone working on the desk of a UK
hire company wouldn't have a single clue what the FTC or the Better Business
Bureau is!

I merely mentioned the options open to me while she phoned everyone.
The truly idiotic thing was that she seemed to have plenty of cars that
would have been idle for the weekend, but didn't want to part with one
of them for less than what she thought she should get. In the end she
folded,
but it illustrates a good point $9 a day to get idle stock rolling vs
a
manager
who would prefer to have idle stock than charge a lower rate. Clearly she
didn't
understand capitalism.

Yes and no. You see hire companies in the UK (don't know how it works in the
USA) don't really make much money at all from hiring cars out to people.
They make the majority of the cash from buying cars in bulk from the
manufacturer at a reduced rate, running them for ~13k miles and then selling
them for *more* than they pay for them.

Customers hiring the car are there to put the milage up, and make a bit of
money too of course. The point being every time a customer hires a car they
are putting more miles on the clock and bringing the car closer to the time
it needs to be sold. From their point of view they would rather run the car
for a high rental amount rather than a small one, even if that means the car
sitting idle over the weekends.

Mark Hewitt wrote:

"Errol" wrote in message
...

"Mark Hewitt" wrote in message
...

You're wrong. Our base prices are way down, and the insurance is not that
bad either. For example, a recent weekend rate for car rental (obviously
a special deal) from a branch near me, for their bottom of the range
car was $9 a day. Reason being that the branch was normally used
by business people so, lots of cars idle on weekends.


I haven't found your base prices to be "way down". They are slightly down,
and then go up massively when you add in all the insurance.

I don't generally add in the insurance on a domestic (US) rental since
liability is generally included and I have collision protection through
my own insurance. Additionally, secondary coverage is also offered by my
credit cards. I was in Costa Rica recently and not only did they want an
absurd amount for CDW, but there was still about a $1000 deductible even
if you took the coverage. Taxes and insurance were more than the base
rental price of the car.

Errol wrote:


Don't want to get into the details because I might get someone
fired.

This I don't understand. So, rather than complain about a problem, you
don't want the person causing the problem to get into trouble?????????
You actually want them to continue to give bad service?

On Sat, 03 Jan 2004 19:33:11 +0000, Mark Hewitt wrote:


"Errol" wrote in message
...

So here's an example for January 10-11 Avis at Philly base rate is
$31.98 while for LHR it's 40 quid or $71. That's a significant difference
to
start with.
Also, remember that a lot of US people have insurance for their own
vehicles
which automatically covers them so they don't need the addtional.

UK insurance doesn't cover you for driving hire cars, or usually any car
rather than your own. Neither do credit cards provide coverage. I would
guess your US insurance wouldn't cover UK rental anyway.

But credit cards do.

So I say again, you need to compare the price inclusive of insurance. You
are comparing the USA base price which doesn't include insurance with the UK
price that does! It's not uncommon for US rental companies insurance to more
than double the base price. If you compare the real cost, inclusive of
everything, and excepting one off special deals, I doubt you would see much
difference at all, despite motoring being considerably more expensive in the
UK.

But compare with Germany for instance. Why do rentals cost twice as much
in the UK, and why do they often try to trick you into buying insurance
that you don't need?

"Mark Hewitt" wrote in message
...
On a point of interest. I'm hiring a car myself at the weekend. From
Newcastle (NCL) airport. Even tho I'm local to it and not flying there.

Weekend rate for a medium size car e.g. Ford Focus 1.6
Alamo - £123
National - £66

To test the theory US cars are cheaper I looked up the price for the same
period and a similar car from National (same company as UK) from Washington
Dulles Airport.

Total price £114. Bit different from the £66! The insurance, taxes, etc etc
amount to around 3/4 of the price of the rental! My point again being, these
are all included in the UK price, but not in the US price. Compare like with
like ;-)

"Mark Hewitt" wrote in message
...

"Errol" wrote in message
...

So here's an example for January 10-11 Avis at Philly base rate is
$31.98 while for LHR it's 40 quid or $71. That's a significant
difference
to
start with.
Also, remember that a lot of US people have insurance for their own
vehicles
which automatically covers them so they don't need the addtional.

UK insurance doesn't cover you for driving hire cars, or usually any car
rather than your own. Neither do credit cards provide coverage. I would
guess your US insurance wouldn't cover UK rental anyway.

So I say again, you need to compare the price inclusive of insurance.

Ok. As of now the Philly base price has gone down to $15.99
+ Taxes and Surcharges of 4.49 and 1.24 + Insurance of
Loss damage waiver at 20.99 + Personal Accident of 3.00
+ Personal effects protection 1.59 + Additional Liability of 11.95
(This is way more cover than you need btw) you get to $59.61

Now for Thiefrow: all in with the same options for 73.91 quid
which is $132.55 at the interbank rate.
$59.61 vs $132.55 - I rest my case m'lud.

Errol

"mrraveltay" wrote in message
...
Errol wrote:


Don't want to get into the details because I might get someone
fired.

This I don't understand. So, rather than complain about a problem, you
don't want the person causing the problem to get into trouble?????????
You actually want them to continue to give bad service?

Well, the incident was settled after she kept me waiting for two hours.
In my terms that's a huge waste of my time. If she hadnt settled it,
I certainly would have. It was merely one of a number of incidents
I have had with car rental agencies in the UK for 5 years running.
All different agencies, all of whom I use in the US without mishap.
In fact, the one that I had a problem with on the 20th didnt have
a booked category car for me in Chicago a year ago. They let me
have a brand new Lincoln with Voicestar GPS to use at the regular base
price.
Now that's service!

Errol

Errol said:

Ok. As of now the Philly base price has gone down to $15.99
+ Taxes and Surcharges of 4.49 and 1.24 + Insurance of
Loss damage waiver at 20.99 + Personal Accident of 3.00
+ Personal effects protection 1.59 + Additional Liability of 11.95
(This is way more cover than you need btw) you get to $59.61

Now for Thiefrow: all in with the same options for 73.91 quid
which is $132.55 at the interbank rate.
$59.61 vs $132.55 - I rest my case m'lud.

I don't know how you're calculating the costs and what days you're after,
using but a very quick Travelocity search gives prices from GBP11 per day
picking up and dropping off at LHR. Even Hertz is GBP19.

Cheers, Howard