Car Hire - too good to be true?

northernlife

Funny how Natwest have their bank account flagged as fraud then - that is how our payment bounced back.

Seems they have multiple bank accounts, multiple addresses and multiple phone numbers too. Yet to hear from ONE person who has ever got a car from them - so I still say it's a scam if they have never delivered anything. They told us they were brokers and never had their own cars anyway - so what is this 'fleet' of cars about?

masterpaintergiraffe

I appeared to have been scammed by rentmac - £469 bacs payment. It all seems so stupid and gullible now, in retrospect. Booked and paid over a week ago; polite and friendly service, even advised me to get the cheapest car. The car wasn't delivered this morning at 09.00 as arranged. I have phoned rentmac many times today since on 0844 4744040 ( a number that costs me 5p per minute and makes rentmac a further profit of 1p per minute). I either get told that someone will call me back - and doesn't - or most recently a man quite aggressively assured me the car would arrive by 16.00!!! When I asked him how legitimate the company was he became more aggressive and hung up. I trusted this company because they have for days been advertising full page on the back page of The Guardian newspaper (I agree with an earlier post - The Guardian must have some responsibility - they must have been paid?! and therefore profited from this scam that utilizes the Guardian's reputation). So now I - like many others - have no way of getting around this xmas - plans out the window.

FM100

northernlife wrote: »

Funny how Natwest have their bank account flagged as fraud then - that is how our payment bounced back.

Seems they have multiple bank accounts, multiple addresses and multiple phone numbers too. Yet to hear from ONE person who has ever got a car from them - so I still say it's a scam if they have never delivered anything. They told us they were brokers and never had their own cars anyway - so what is this 'fleet' of cars about?

Funny how their non existent cars are in Scotland, how convenient for them. I wonder who thought that excuse up!

:rotfl:

jamesbrownontheroad

Please don't interpret this as schadenfraüde, because it is absolutely not intended that way. I've only just found this thread and I sympathise deeply with everyone who has been scammed. However I remember seeing the first ad a few weeks ago and being very surprised that a car rental company / agency would go so far as to advertise a specific make and model of car. Hertz used to offer a premium line of sporty, eco and deluxe models at US rental locations which were guaranteed to be the make and model you reserved. However even that small range became almost to guarantee, because car hire companies have so many cars, so many locations and so many customers that it becomes impossible to rent a precise make and model of vehicle, instead of a general class.

Secondly, RentMac appear not to be members of the BVRLA. Very odd, event for an agency.

Good luck to everyone seeking their money back.

Samanco

Has anyone actually received a car from these guys? A few posts on this (and other threads) saying people were expecting their cars on 23 and 24th, but no updates. We're 'expecting' one this morning. Should probably just go out eh?...

northernlife

I've not read anywhere of anyone actually getting any cars. Either you can't get through to them or in (two cases so far) it appears they have spoken to someone who have promised to phone them back and they haven't. Search on the Guardian for the article warning readers not to use them too. Good luck in getting your money back everyone.

northernlife

jamesbrownontheroad wrote: »

Please don't interpret this as schadenfraüde, because it is absolutely not intended that way. I've only just found this thread and I sympathise deeply with everyone who has been scammed. However I remember seeing the first ad a few weeks ago and being very surprised that a car rental company / agency would go so far as to advertise a specific make and model of car. Hertz used to offer a premium line of sporty, eco and deluxe models at US rental locations which were guaranteed to be the make and model you reserved. However even that small range became almost to guarantee, because car hire companies have so many cars, so many locations and so many customers that it becomes impossible to rent a precise make and model of vehicle, instead of a general class.

Secondly, RentMac appear not to be members of the BVRLA. Very odd, event for an agency.

Good luck to everyone seeking their money back.

Whilst I agree with your points about specific cars - there are plenty of prestige companies around that let you hire 'exactly' what you want - for example Guy Salmon (which if you check out that website Rentmac is a clone of - thus making it more convincing to scam people)

I should have checked the BVRLA, good point.

Thankfully I got my funds back - anyone else any updates?

Samanco

Well, not surprised to report that the car didn't arrive yesterday. Thankfully we paid by credit card, so should be fine with refunds. Rather than charging 1,384 pounds (384 for car, 1,000 deposit) they charged 3,400 and then credited 1,000 back the next dat. Weird.

Not sure if they're scammers, novices, totally out of their depth, or whatever. But whatever you do, don't touch these guys with a barge pole.

northernlife

Samanco wrote: »

Well, not surprised to report that the car didn't arrive yesterday. Thankfully we paid by credit card, so should be fine with refunds. Rather than charging 1,384 pounds (384 for car, 1,000 deposit) they charged 3,400 and then credited 1,000 back the next dat. Weird.

Not sure if they're scammers, novices, totally out of their depth, or whatever. But whatever you do, don't touch these guys with a barge pole.

That is odd. They didn't even charge our card (mind you, they had our BACS transfer, so that must have kept them going anyway!)

Seems a very odd scam, I mean - the lengths they have gone to at least, a lot of it could easily have been recreated without newspaper ads, forming a limited company, etc..

Samanco

It does make me wonder if they started off genuine, and it all then went horribly wrong. If that is the case - and who knows what the truth is - they should put a message on their telephone line and something honest on their website, and not keep people in the dark. We wouldn't like it, but at least we'd know where we all stood. Silence just makes everyone assume the worst.