Rentalcars.com

Rentalcars.com is a total fraud (and spammers too)

This company (which is part of Priceline) has lots of terms and conditions which work against you and we have ended up with paying 256 for *nothing* in the end. Here is the story:

On a family trip in Italy, we have made reservation for a car rental from this website in May 2013. We have especially requested a navigation device during reservation to find our way easily around the country.

On 19th of May we went to SicilyByCar desk at Rome Termini Station to pick up our car. We paid the deposit, signed the papers and got the keys. When we arrived at the parking lot to pick up the car, we were told that they have no navigation device available! We had to go back to train station (which is 300m away) and ask the lady at SicilyByCar desk. When we asked why she had not told us that navigation device was not available before and made us go through all the signing papers and paying deposit procedure, she did not have any answer at all! We were really disappointed and frustrated.

The only way to go was cancelling the reservation and renting another car from another dealer. So I called RentalCars.com customer services and was told that I need to pay half of reservation fee as a penalty and that was because the pickup time had passed. But we had not get in the car at all! Just because the pick-up time has passed we were made to pay 256 for nothing, simply nothing! All we get was disappointment and frustration in the middle of our trip. Not to mention the half of day we lost during reservations.

When I have placed a complaint, I got a response a month later, which says this is according to their terms and conditions and they will do nothing about it. The rep's last sentence in the email was:

"We are not in position to refund you the rental price and we now close the matter"

That's all I was able to get back. (oh, and daily spam emails)

So, STAY AWAY FROM RENTALCARS.COM, if you want to stay stress free.

Rented a minivan and was billed immediately on 6/13/20 for $246.14. Picked up the minivan from Routes Car Rental in Atlanta (NEVER AGAIN - FOR EITHER) Jul 8,2020 and waited over an hour to get my van. They were using it to shuttle ppl back and forth to the airport because their shuttle was in the shop. After going back and forth wondering what's taking so long. Randall explained and apologized. He stated he will make an adjustment for the inconvenience and appreciated my patience. The new contract is for $180.54. There's a difference owed to me now of $65.60. FYI, they only put about a qtr of gas and did not clean the inside or outside of the vehicle either. I returned the vehicle Jul 13,2020 and Randall confirmed I would receive my credit in a few days. I have had several correspondence and had to make several phone calls to Routes for my credit. Their customer service is non-existent and you have to dig to find a telephone number for them. They want you to send an email. Finally, an email on 7/22/2020 stating my credit was authorized but now I have to contact Rentalcars.com for the refund. After a few emails and filing a complaint on their site because there is no telephone number listed, They sent me an email today, Aug 5,2020, with some bs excuse of how they are prorating my credit and only issued a credit of $36.06. Now I have provided the new contract to them that was given to me and they are refusing to honor it. I will never rent from either of them again! They first tried to say I returned it early and had unused days, I even explained why the credit was issued. I filed a complaint with the BBB, consumer affairs and I'm posting a review anywhere I can until I get the rest of my money.

On the 30.11.2021 I made a reservation (Booking Reference Number: *******) for an SUV car in Dubai 1. 12. 2021—5. 12. 2021Because of 5 hours in the return date they charge an extra FULL day, but this is not the bad story yet... When my wife, 3 kids and I reached the DBX airport the representative of THRIFTY office, the supplier, said I can not have the car because I have only my international license and not Memsi doc as an extra.
I showed her the voucher RentalCars.com supplied me with and not mention anything there but:
"License: the main driver will need to provide a full driving license in their name" and this is exactly what I had! As always (this is not my first time renting a car abroad)
She even refused that I will send someone in my country to go the Memsi office to create for me the additional document she asked for... She "can't accept online documents or PDF"!
But she was kind of fair and said you can't have the car but you will NOT be charged by Thrifty not even for a penny.
When I contacted the RentalCars customer service I felt the lowest possible quality of service you can ever imagine.
Not only is the team rude and not helpful, you get the feeling they are happy when you don't receive the car you order and now you stuck in foreign country trying to plan different transportation ideas...
I asked for a refund as I don't get the car
And Thrifty never charged anything
And you never mention in your voucher I need to supply extra documents,
They send you rude and cold terms and conditions link you should read and follow.
I was a 16 years customer of RentalCars.com and Booking.com and Priceline with Genius level 2 rank BUT I will NEVER EVER work with it again, will you?
I could understand if I was asked to cover their costs on this reservation if they were any, I don't think anyone should be lost but they refused to refund and lost huge family and friends that will never order anything under priceline brands! If someone that reads this is still considering booking something with them, READ IN FULL of all the documents, they hide the small letter and will never show you in the voucher the real truth!

I made a reservation through Priceline.com for a car rental for Mexico. As soon as I arrived to Mexico to pick up the car, the personal in the airport requested me a deposit of $10,500 dollar, plus full coverage for the vehicle in top of what I paid for the reservation. That information was not part of the reservation. I did not pick up the car and rental cars.com did not reimburse my reservation. It was horrible to try to contacted them. My family and I experienced the worst in a foreign country because of the lack of information that rentalcars.com.The worst reservation and worst customer service. Not recommended!

Email response:

Dear Mr. Rodriguez,

Thanks for your email. I am really sorry to see that you are not happy with the outcome of this case but we are unable to change our decision due to the terms and conditions.

It was clearly mentioned in the terms of the rental and the package which you chose says itself that its a basic package and does not include any Collision Damage Waiver or Theft Protection. 

Mandatory Coverage

Paying mandatory coverage charges
Please bring a letter from your credit card company, confirming that you have the right cover for this rental. If you can't supply this proof, the counter staff will insist that you buy the cover at the counter.

Collision Damage Waiver (CDW)
If the car's bodywork gets damaged, the most you'll pay towards repairs covered by the Collision Damage Waiver is the damage excess. This cover is only valid if you stick to the terms of the rental agreement. It doesn't cover other parts of the car (e.g. Glass, wheels, interior, roof or undercarriage), or charges (e.g. For towing or off-road time), or anything in the car (e.g. Child seats, GPS devices or personal belongings).

Theft Protection (TP)
This rental doesn't include Theft Protection.
Unless you have another policy that provides protection, you will be responsible for the full cost of replacing or repairing the car if it is stolen, or damaged while someone is trying to steal it.


These things are also mentioned on your voucher and on rental terms. This was shown on website as well which you accepted as the booking cannot e made until you accept the terms of the rental. 

We hope that you can understand why we must have a cancellation policy in place, and why on this occasion we are unable to offer you any refund.


This case is now close and we will not be able to reopen this case. Please do not reply to this message. 

Thanks
Regards

Noman

Rentalcars.com were really good in the early days, but since they've been bought by booking.com, the service has deteriorated massively.

It's easy enough to book a car online with them, it's a slick sales operation and the rates are competitive. But if anything goes wrong, or anything needs cancelling or changing, woe betide - you're screwed.

Try phoning them … ain; t going to happen. Even if you *can* find a number which is other than a message or out of service, you won't get an operator. Just a recorded message telling you how to negotiate the web site.

Personal issue here - I had to cancel a booking in person at the SixT counter in Manchester airport.

No problem, said SixT - we won't charge you, you haven't used the car but you booked it and paid up front (£750) through rentalcars.com so you will need to contact them to get your refund. We won't charge for it.

Bad luck, said rentalcars.com when (after 3 days of trying) I finally got through to someone. The app doesn't let you contact us until the rental period has finished. But you have to contact us at the time the cancellation is made. You have to wait until the expiry of the rental period. By which time it's too late, they say.

This is a really slippery operation now, seriously

Of course, as you can probably guess, rentalcars.com email you (you can't reply to the email - it's read-only) to tell you that even though the rental car company isn't going to charge for the cancelled reservation, rentalcars.com will keep your money because their weasel clauses - the small print - are very Weasley indeed! They won't repay me my £700 even though SixT (who were great, btw) didn't charge for the rental as I didn't take the car.

I've used these guys (rentalcars) for over 20 years, but since booking.com took them over and got rid of the personal touch, the phone lines, and indeed dropped any sort of customer service, I will never use them again, and I would and will advise anyone else who considers using them, to be very careful indeed, as this new iteration of a once-good company is now an unreasonable money-grabbing, mechanized outfit with zero customer service.

In circumstances like this, we - the customers - are buggered. Rentalcars.com take your money up front, and their small print is ridiculous. They email you from unmonitored email addresses to tell you they're robbing you. There are no proper customer service numbers. 20 years of being a good company (in the old days, when you could phone them directly, they were a great company - helpful, on the spot, etc …) now they're just an automated part of a hug money-making operation, and frankly they are complete $#*!e.

Hot tip. Do a deal with a rental car company direct. They still tend to be honorable folk. I'm a decent, honest reasonable man, but I can tell you this absolutely - Rentalcars.com are absolutely not honorable, slippery as eels, and I will never touch them again.

After looking through some rental companies, and trying to get some quotes for a weekend trip, we discovered what looked like a good price from an established rental company in Rentalcars.com

We could not have been more wrong.

One thing is for sure they do everything they can to not make it clear how much you will be paying before you pay.

When going through the process we could not see how much the total cost was with insurance, and the only way to find out was when they ended up charging us! (would you buy something without being made aware the full-cost with ANY product or service? I would never)

I kept checking with my friend on each page asking if he could see the total price and he could not, so we would continue until they surprised us with a purchase confirmation.

So - we did what any sane person would do and tried to cancel. Thus being hit with a cancellation policy that would see us lose all the money we weren't intending to pay anyway.

I figured the Customer Service team would be able to help considering the circumstances and considering that the issue took place only minutes earlier. However, when we started a live-chat - the CS rep would not listen, telling us where to find the price after we paid (which was the issue we contacted about) and kept referring us to the Cancellation Policy, rather than listen and find a solution.

When I rung up the next day, another CS rep also kept referring me to the Policy and refused to listen to the situation that occurred. They wouldn't even let me speak to a supervisor, and responded to my questions with the same script ("Due to our cancellation policy...").

Their website is broken and preys on people looking for good deals, but doesn't make aware of how much a person is paying ahead of time. Once they have your money they will blindly smash the cancellation policy over your head until you submit.

Not once in my payment history have I ever been surprised by a payment on checkout, which speaks volumes of Rentalcars terrible consumer practices.

I would never trust this company again - and will recommend all my friends and family to avoid this company at all costs.

After a quick search I can see more rental car websites with transparent pricing breakdowns (ahead of purchase). They will be getting my business in the future.