Additional car hire charges after holiday

Make-it-3

I've opened our credit card statement today to find £80 of extra charges that the car hire company has billed us for from a trip back in April.

When we returned the car it was checked over and we were told everything was fine. I've now thrown the contract away thinking I no longer needed it.

My question is, can a car hire company just bill your credit card without telling you why or what for. Seems out of order to me. Tried disputing it with cc company but they have told us to contact the car co.

I booked online here through an online travel agency and I can't see them being terribly interested in help us track down what these charges are.

pompeyrich

I'm sure there will be a clause in the small print allowing them to take money from your card in certain circumstances. You really need to know what the amount is for, fuel, extra insurance they may have added, parking ticket, speed camera fine. I would e mail the online travel agent and the hire company, for confirmation.

SaveTheEuro

Of course they shouldn't take money from your credit card without informing you why, but they do.

Make contact with the car hire company to find out what the charge was for, and dispute it if you think it's not fair.

I had a similar charge. I was told it was because I had returned the car late. I insisted that wasn't true and the charge was refunded.

malkie76

Are you positive you returned the car fully fueled ? (and have the receipts?)
Did you take a sat nav ? (as they are often added after the originally billing)

benjus

I would contact the car company directly and ask for a breakdown of the charges. If they refuse or if the breakdown does not match what you should be paying, get back to the credit card company and don't let them fob you off. My girlfriend recently had this problem and HSBC refunded most of the money to her credit card.

Make-it-3

We paid for the car hire in advance on different card. But when we collected the car we were told we had to pay them for a tank of fuel upfront (at an inflated price) and then we could bring the car back empty - of course you can never actually return it completely empty so they make on that too. We turned down all the other extras/upgrades they tried to sell us.

I'm not saying there couldn't possibly be some parking infringement or the like, but nothing we know about. But to just put it through to the credit card without telling us, several months after the event, when they said everything was ok when we returned the car. Seems out of order to me.

Am I supposed to keep the car hire paperwork forever, surely there must be some time limit too?

The fact that the car hire was paid through an intermediary, its a big rental company, trying to track down the booking without the paperwork, and that we paid for that on a different card is going to make sorting this out a real nightmare. Grrrrrrr!

Make-it-3

It was Dollar or shall I call them "Steal Some Extra Dollars"

ferf1223

have you contacted Dollar? I'm not sure what the 3rd party has to do with it - they didn't charge your card the additional amount - it would be Dollar who would be able to answer your questions, wouldn't it? If it were me, I would go to dollar's website, find the location you rented from and call them (using the international call checker if appropriate to minimize costs).

pompeyrich

ferf1223 wrote: »

have you contacted Dollar? I'm not sure what the 3rd party has to do with it - they didn't charge your card the additional amount - it would be Dollar who would be able to answer your questions, wouldn't it? If it were me, I would go to dollar's website, find the location you rented from and call them (using the international call checker if appropriate to minimize costs).

Worth contacting the 3rd party too, as they are who it was booked through. Maybe slightly different but if you buy something from a shop, your contract is with the shop not the manufacturer.

Westin

I'm not saying there couldn't possibly be some parking infringement or the like, but nothing we know about. But to just put it through to the credit card without telling us, several months after the event, when they said everything was ok when we returned the car. Seems out of order to me.

If it was a parking or traffic offence then the car hire company would not know about it when you returned the car. Often these fines are sent by the local motoring organisation or police some weeks/months later, which is why that only now the charge to your credit card has been made.

ferf1223

pompeyrich wrote: »

Worth contacting the 3rd party too, as they are who it was booked through. Maybe slightly different but if you buy something from a shop, your contract is with the shop not the manufacturer.

But the charges were made locally - not by the 3rd party...ultimately until it's determined what the charges were for (which the local rental agency will be better able to answer than the 3rd party) it's impossible to say for certain...but sounds to me like something outside of the contract with the 3rd party...anytime we've rented with a 3rd party the T&Cs specifically state that any charges made locally are nothing to do with the 3rd party.