Don't be fooled by the cheap price. This is a terrible experience vs. the mainstream car rental companies
Don't be fooled by the cheap price.
Their apparent strategy is to draw you in with a very cheap headline price and then do everything possible to pressure you to take their expensive insurance once you're in there.
This industry is so badly in need of proper regulation!
A list of the key issues i encountered at the Hilton Paddington branch:
- Rude and badly trained staff
- Claim not to accept AMEX for excess deposit and that it's very clear in the confirmation email (it is mentioned in footnote 17 in illegible format and tiny font size)
- As a consequence, to use my Visa card they could "only accept a max. of £400 deposit" from the card, which - wait for it... - could only be allowed if i purchased the extra daily excess waiver insurance, which - wait for it.... - only costs £32 extra per day, i.e. more than doubling the car rental charge
- As an alternative i offered to pay them up front with my debit card the entire excess (or even the entire value of the car), which they could refund to me on return
- They claimed their "merchant" wouldn't allow that transaction because they "recently changed merchants"
- in summary this was a waste of 2 hours of my time and the staff did nothing but lie and push to sell me insurance from the minute i walked in there
- I have learnt the hard way, but the moral of the story is just pay more for a reputable established brand like Avis. it is really not worth the time and stress to save £10/15 per day