Problems with Argus car hire and Avis

Harvsurrey

Now this goes back a little while , in May 2009 i hired a car in Cyprus for 4 days via Argus car hire .
I arrived , presented my voucher ,hired my car and had no issues . I returned the car and returned home without an issue .

Fast forward to Jan 2010 , i had just returned from a trip to the USA and whilst carefully looking at my CC statement found a charge from Avis in Cyrus .

I immediately contacted my bank , and disputed the CC charge stating as they could see i was in the USA.

They investigated , and told me Argus car hire (or correctly cartrawler.net) had not paid Avis enough for my hire as they had been using incorrect rates , therefore Avis had billed me some 7 months later.

I told the bank that i had not had a contract with Avis for payment ,but with Argus who had provided the voucher , and i had only authorized Avis to debit my card for any damage as is the norm .

I also pointed out that the issue was between Argus and Avis , not with myself , if they had not paid Avis enough that was their issue not mine .

I spoke to Avis who referred me to Argus , who in turn referred me to Avis .

Despite me urging the CC company that this was, as i could see it an unauthorized charge on my account ,and an attempt at avis from getting there money from the wrong source and in my view THEFT by Avis .

The cc company have twice refuted my claim ,and Avis say its not their problem (they might think differently if i can find a way to pursue fraud charges)

I am currently at a loss as to where to go next , i have the paperwork to back up the fact cartrawler underpaid Avis as the bank provided this in their investigation , any help gratefully received.

lucia67

Sorry to hear about your predicament with Argus, I'm sorry I cant tell you what you should do next but if its any compensation we also had problem with Argus back in summer 2008, we hired a car from naples airport via argus website, which directed us to dollar thrifty the people at the arrival airport in naples where we hired the car. We had ordered a car that had been set in c group if i remember rightly which would have been an air conditioned car 4 door, ford focus type with boot space for all 4 passengers bags. We paid via the Argus site before flying, from the UK and took the relevant paperwork with us, but when we arrived we were given the keys and took the 5 minute bus trip to where the car was parked in the parking space outside the airport. Surprisingly when we got to it, we were presented with a smart car, big enough to get around town let alone to do a few 100 km drive further south of the country. So we had to get back on that bus and go to the Dollar thrifty desk and tell the guy with the i dont really care attitude who also had the cheek to tell me that this is what we booked on the argus site, which was a d group car and no amount of advising them that is not what we ordered actually helped. Unfortunately the paperwork that showed the group we did actually order we left at home, not that it would have made a difference mind. In the end we had to pay an extra £200 approx to get a bigger car they gave us a station wagon which was about 10 years old and had a really poor air con system and was really tired looking. So when we got home and contacted Argus they told us to speak to Dollar thifty and we told them they were responsible and sent the all the receipts and paperwork to them in Ireland, but nothing came of it in the end as my partner unknowingly sent the paperwork as first class post. I know, if he had spoken with me I would have put the correct postage on it, so we contacted royal mail and its they told us that letters sent with the incorrect stampage would eventually be opened and sent back to sender, yeah in theory but 2 years down the line we never did get that back. So we had to drop it, but we have wanted to post a bad review about this so called car hire company on a website but not even got round to that. Do you know a good site where we can post bad reviews? Have you done so already?
We will never book via the middle man again, either book direct with avis, hertz etc, or do it with them direct upon arrival at the destination. Well, I wish you luck sorting this out.

custardy

lucia67 wrote: »

Sorry to hear about your predicament with Argus, I'm sorry I cant tell you what you should do next but if its any compensation we also had problem with Argus back in summer 2008,

we hired a car from naples airport via argus website, which directed us to dollar thrifty the people at the arrival airport in naples where we hired the car. We had ordered a car that had been set in c group if i remember rightly which would have been an air conditioned car 4 door, ford focus type with boot space for all 4 passengers bags. We paid via the Argus site before flying,

from the UK and took the relevant paperwork with us, but when we arrived we were given the keys and took the 5 minute bus trip to where the car was parked in the parking space outside the airport. Surprisingly when we got to it,

we were presented with a smart car, big enough to get around town let alone to do a few 100 km drive further south of the country. So we had to get back on that bus and go to the Dollar thrifty desk and tell the guy with the i dont really care attitude who also had the cheek to tell me that this is what we booked on the argus site,

which was a d group car and no amount of advising them that is not what we ordered actually helped. Unfortunately the paperwork that showed the group we did actually order we left at home, not that it would have made a difference mind.

In the end we had to pay an extra £200 approx to get a bigger car they gave us a station wagon which was about 10 years old and had a really poor air con system and was really tired looking. So when we got home and contacted Argus they told us to speak to Dollar thifty and we told them they were responsible and sent the all the receipts and paperwork to them in Ireland, but nothing came of it in the end as my partner unknowingly sent the paperwork as first class post.

I know, if he had spoken with me I would have put the correct postage on it, so we contacted royal mail and its they told us that letters sent with the incorrect stampage would eventually be opened and sent back to sender, yeah in theory but 2 years down the line we never did get that back.

So we had to drop it, but we have wanted to post a bad review about this so called car hire company on a website but not even got round to that. Do you know a good site where we can post bad reviews? Have you done so already?


We will never book via the middle man again, either book direct with avis, hertz etc, or do it with them direct upon arrival at the destination. Well, I wish you luck sorting this out.

i had to split your post as i cant read massive blocks of text like that

did you not use a trackable method of postage given the money involved?