Drive Assist and Aviva ...Hire Car while your car is off the road...BEWARE

torbayman

Drive Assist have been the subject of many warnings on this blogsite, quite rightly too, ... when unsuspecting customers are faced with unjustified charges for non-existant damages to their hire car ....I want to make people out there know that Drive Assist must be resisted even when they take your money via your credit cards ...you can easily get you money back by petitioning your card company and then put your side of the case to them...then STILL RESIST even when Drive Assist come back at you by getting their credit hound company Credit Collections to send you threatening letters demanding payment including imminent drafting of court papers and doom and gloom by suggesting mortgage problems and CCJ records against you ...RESIST ALL THE WAY...it will take 12 months or so but be assured they will give in eventually and apologise ( a letter telling you of internal investigations, it should never have got to this position and all that..) ...the really sinister thing is that your insurance company AVIVA will not help you in any way, legal cover does not protect you here...you are on your own ...AVIVA are a shambles, they introduce this dreadful company to you and then stand back and let you suffer for the 12 months or so it takes for Drive Assist to finally get the message that you will not pay up ... Drive Assist are despicable but AVIVA purport to be a sound company and offer you messages like THE AVIVA DEAL but they are spineless and in the end do not care about their customers ....be also assured there are insurance companies out there that know Drive Assist very well and would never ever use them ....my advice is to ask which hire car company will be employed in the event of an accident before you sign up for car insurance.!!!....:T

karena

Thanks Torbayman for making more people aware, I know Tesco and Direct Line use DA, wonder how many other companies use them? It is so important that people realise that they are not getting a free loan car, and unfortunately the decision is usually taken at a time of complete stress just after an accident!

daveyjp

Do they not offer CDW? My accident managemnt company did.

torbayman

Yes DAVEYJP they did, the whole point of me recalling the incident is to make as many folk as possible aware of the fraud that Drive Assist perpetuate on innocent parties in a car accident who are also careful drivers, to clarify the limitations of Legal Insurance Cover and the way in which some insurance companies behave. CDW is there to insure a driver against having to pay out following VALID damage to a hire car and NOT to protect themselves from fraudsters like Drive Assist who falsify damage reports and then extort money customers with their threats.... companies like DA are Toxic and need to be driven out of business ...all I can do is make others well aware of their nasty tactics...so my advice is find out who your insurance company uses and change your insurance company asap if its Drive Assist ...if you havent been able to do this then be ready for DA's tactics when they appear on your doorstep ...if you still cant be bothered to fight DA out of business then I suppose let this despicable outfit off the hook by shelling out extra cash in advance for their CDW policy ...its your choice !!

dacouch

Torbayman are you aware that BBC Watchdog did a feature on DA doing this a few years back

torbayman

Yes Dacouch thank you I did hear of this in my trawls through blogs ...it gave me much encouragement to keep resisting over the past 12 months ... ...I thought relating my experience would help keep this organization and the shameful role of the Insurance Company high in peoples minds as I dont think the insurance company role was ellaborated upon in the watchdog article ...cheers....:rotfl:

dacouch

Are you aware how much commission Drive Assist paid Aviva for passing you over to them?

torbayman

No...go on surprise me?

dacouch

As a general rule of thumb the going rate is circa £150 for a standard car, for executive etc cars it can be circa £300.

Have you read the other threads about DA on MSE, there are quite a few, there are also a few on the moneysupermarket forums and also some interesting ones on Honestjohn's forum.

torbayman

Hi Dacouch...many thanks for the other threads..I am pleased I blogged on this one ....the money paid by Hire CAR Companies to insurance companies is new to me but should not come as a surprise....it explains why Aviva do not help the customer in any way ... the ref has already been paid off before the match has kicked off..... get THE AVIVA DEAL and get stitched up ...

Do you know if there are there any other hire companies out there quite like Drive Assist ?

dacouch

The market is dominated by Drive Assist and Helphire (And now Enterprise) who have national coverage which is why most Insurers, Legal Companies and Claims Management companies use them. There are plenty of smaller companies with their own stock of vehicles but they tend not to be national and often cross hire eg rent them from DA to rent then rent to you.

DA have a reputation for doing what you had and it's what they were featured on Watchdog for, at the end of the show they promised changes to their systems!

There is an interesting post from an ex employee which explained how they work and the very strict time scales the delivery drivers work to which he explained is why they tend not to not existing damage / deliver with a low fuel. The collection drivers then check the cars and notice the existing damage which you get charged for.

There are plenty of stories around the internet from ex employees of CH companies that they add on extra days to hires to get their figures up or hang out claims to get extra days hire. This is not something I would want to comment on as Helphire are famous for suing. There was a famous email that was sent around lots of us in the industry from allegedly disgruntled ex / current employee. They acted very quickly and you will struggle to find it on the net although some insiders still no doubt have them on the computers!

http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&source=hp&q=helphire+ex+employee+email&meta=&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&gs_rfai=