Europcar trying to hit me 2+months later...

Paulio1978

Hi, looking for some advice if anyone has ever experienced the sane with the utter scam artists Europcar. I hired a car in Bologna Airport, took out full insurance - when I got to the car it was absolutely peppered in damage, which a large portion wasn't mentioned on the form. I spoke to a member of staff, and 2 of them literally said 'don't worry, you have full insurance'...of I went for 3 days and returned it early morning and dropped keys.
2+ months later, I get an email out the blue claiming there's been multiple damage caused by me during my rental?!?!
This is complete codswallop, as I know for a fact no damage occurred in my time of driving it, and what made matters worse was the images they sent of the damage was clearly NOT new in the slightest.
Too and fro for weeks and weeks (which they take an eternity to actually reply!) arguing between us, and they're saying even though I had CDW, there's an 'admin fee' of £91 I have to pay?!?
I spoke to my credit card to block any charges being made - now Europcar have contacted me saying I have to pay within 5 days!

I have zero intention of paying this, and as far as I'm concerned they can take me to court, but has anyone else ever had the same? If so, how did you get around it?
Thanks in advance 

tacpot12

Do you have home insurnace? If so, do you have Legal Expenses cover as part of it? If so, call the insurer up and see if they can offer you any professional advice. Their cover probably doesn't extend to representing you in a European court, but they should be able to confirm what the Italian courts could to do enforce the debt in the UK if you don't defend the case and the court awards a sum to Europcar.  

I think the way to beat this is to confirm that you will fight this in the Italian courts and that you have the financial resources to do so. I would start asking them for all the evidence that you need to take the matter to court, and just tie them up it lots of admin work. I'm guessing they will give up if they think it will be a big job to this into court.  

Lavendyr

Unfortunately this seems to be a very common story with hire car companies. 

When you say you had "full insurance" - what do your policy documents say they cover? Did you take it out at the hire car desk or elsewhere? And did you take photos of the damage on the car when you started the rental?

If you did have full insurance that covers your excess then most should also cover any admin fees. I took out excess insurance on a recent car hire in Italy and was able to reclaim the full amount I was charged, including a €100 admin fee. 

If you didn't have insurance that covers the excess then you may have to pay; in such situations I'd always recommend taking lot of photos of the car when you collect it and when you drop it off as evidence to refute any accusations of damage made by the car hire company after the rental ends. 

Paulio1978

Thanks for your comments - the whole thing is a complete joke, do they honestly think that over 2 months since my hire I'm going to cave in and just buckle to their fabricated nonsense.
It's as if Europcar picked my name out of a hat and thought 'you know what, let's get something out of this guy'.
I'm just going to ignore them, and until and Italian bailiff comes knocking on my door...I've got better things to think about in this life than ridiculous companies trying to scam customers 

eDicky

Bravo...!!

Lavendyr

Paulio1978 said:

Thanks for your comments - the whole thing is a complete joke, do they honestly think that over 2 months since my hire I'm going to cave in and just buckle to their fabricated nonsense.
It's as if Europcar picked my name out of a hat and thought 'you know what, let's get something out of this guy'.
I'm just going to ignore them, and until and Italian bailiff comes knocking on my door...I've got better things to think about in this life than ridiculous companies trying to scam customers 

While I understand your view, it'd be helpful if you could answer the questions asked so that we can advise you best. Of course if you never intend to hire a car again, or drive in Italy again, I'm sure you'll be fine... but if you do have better things to think about, the question does occur as to why you posted here in the first place? Was there something in particular that you wanted to achieve?

Lavendyr

If it helps - I got stung by my hire car company Noleggiare in Italy for a scuff that I could not prove was there at the start of the rental despite taking lots of pics. However I took out excess hire car insurance which cost me about £50 and covered anything I'd need to pay. I submitted the claim when I got home and had the money in my bank account days later to cover the charges - including the admin fee. 

Short story - get excess cover, don't buy it through the hire car company and especially not at the desk. 

Paulio1978

My purpose was to see if anyone else had ever experienced a similar situation before...and if so, how did they avoid paying anything, or was the problem simply ignored - and do Europcar have any kind of power to enforce legal action in another country.
There was also some venting going on, because I have personally wasted so much time on this ridiculous situation.
It was a very last minute trip for work, so was all a little frantic - and not being regular hire car user, if I'm honest, I'm not massively familiar with the etiquette to ensure I wasn't stung by them.
I did the diligent thing, and walked around the car, comparing damage on the sheet vs what was actually there. I then went back to the handover office and gave instruction to the staff that the sheet didn't match, and requested additional damage to be added...where I had a typical Italian shrug met with "you be OK, you have full insurance" - therefore I assumed (now wrongly of course!) that there'd be no further issues...no I didn't take images.
I have fed all this back to Europcar, and they are simply not interested. The poor images they sent, the complete lack of process they don't seem to follow, their abysmal communication and lack of coherent translation from Italian to English...it's as if they're tyring to make it as awkward as possible so that I cave in.
I didn't take out additional insurance or excess protection on top of the full, collision damage waiver - nor did I think I'd need to - I didn't cause one miniscule amount of damage to that vehicle - and the come back to me 2 months after the event claiming this is completely unreasonable.
So, my last move was to send them on a wild goose chase, creating as much admin for them as possible requesting loads of information before I even consider giving them any money - requesting copies of before and after check sheets, transcripts from their 'investigation' where they must've interviewed the staff working on the day to check my claim of the request to add the extra damage etc etc....
After this situation, I'll certainly be doing all I can to ensure I cover backside when I hire a car next - and with my intention to ever use Europcar again?...absolutely not....but I'm sure they're all as bad as eachother!
What really annoys me is that on any review sites (Google, TripAdvisor, TrustPilot etc), there are so many people saying the same thing over and over about hire car companies constantly ripping customers off...this post's intention was also to create further awareness for others to stop them suffering too...

Lavendyr

Yeah it seems to happen a lot and I do get the frustration - I couldn't believe it when they managed to find damage on the one part of the car I didn't have a clear enough picture of! I think they are honestly all as bad as each other and it is a proper minefield.

Definitely recommend getting excess insurance next time though, and it is so much cheaper to buy separately (I used Zurich but there are several providers) - I paid £50 and it covered me for up to £6000. My excess was €2500 and the damage they found ended up costing about £350 so it was worth while getting. If I'd bought the same insurance through the online car hire booking I'd have paid about £110 and if I'd bought it when picking up the car, about £300. 

[Deleted User]

Photograph the car when you collect it and when you drop it off. Email them to customer services straight away.

I'm sure these companies try to sting everyone for damage if they don't see them taking photos of the car.