Europcar charges

GHurn

We had booked europcar to be collected from Bordeaux airport through Easyjet. When we arrived late, as the flight had been delayed, they said we were a "no show" and we had to pay the hire car charge again to Europcar. It wasn't at the same cost as the original booking but 3 times the amount ! They then went to the draw where our booking details were in with the keys of the vehicle we had hired ! What a scam and although we have lodged a complaint with Easyjet they keep fobbing us off. Has anyone had a similar thing happen to them and what action did you take ? Should we take this up with Europcar or Easyjet?

oldernonethewiser

You need to check the T&Cs of the hire agreement.

Have seen this mentioned before on other forums so it does happen.

eDicky

Did you book directly with Europcar, through easyJet, or..? Did you enter your arrival flight number on the booking..?

oldernonethewiser

The OP states "through Easyjet" who use Cartrawler I believe.

tightauldgit

GHurn said:

We had booked europcar to be collected from Bordeaux airport through Easyjet. When we arrived late, as the flight had been delayed, they said we were a "no show" and we had to pay the hire car charge again to Europcar. It wasn't at the same cost as the original booking but 3 times the amount ! They then went to the draw where our booking details were in with the keys of the vehicle we had hired ! What a scam and although we have lodged a complaint with Easyjet they keep fobbing us off. Has anyone had a similar thing happen to them and what action did you take ? Should we take this up with Europcar or Easyjet?

What's the nature of your complaint? Did you advise them you would be arriving late when your flight was delayed? If so, what did they say at that time? How late were you in arriving?

Most hire car T&Cs will have a couple of hours leeway and then you will be deemed a no-show and your booking cancelled. If you then want to make a new booking you will be charged the rate on the day. Go through and check what your terms say and see if Europcar complied with them. 

Easyjet aren't responsibile for consequential losses caused by the delay of their flight, Europcar have probably followed the terms you signed up to, I don't see that you really have any legal right to anything other than a goodwill gesture from either. 

Check if you might be covered on your travel insurance.

teignmouthtrish

I booked, and paid for, a rental car to be picked up at 4.45pm from Europcar, as my train (6.5hr journey) was due to arrive in at 4.30pm ish. It actually arrived at 4.45 but Google maps said it was only a 5 minute walk so there shouldn't have been a problem getting there before the office shut. However, I took a wrong turning, then was misdirected and it seemed I might be late, so I tried the phone number on the bottom of the booking form, but it wasn't a direct line, and only offered to tell me about Europcar mobility, and their data protection policy etc,  so I gave up on that and just ran for it. However, it was 5.03pm when I got there, and the office was shut. A notice on the door gave a phone number, which was supposedly available until 6pm but no one answered it. I found a few other Europcar numbers, on my phone, with no joy. Without a car, I couldn't continue my journey and was forced to book into a hotel for the night. When I picked up my car the next morning, the staff in the Europcar office said that there never was anyone available after 5pm. I have contacted Europcar and asked for a refund of the £79 I paid for the hotel room, on the basis that they gave me no other option. They are refusing to pay, as they say that I 'made no attempt to contact them to say that I would be late'. Although I would like my money to be returned I think there is also a wider issue here - is it OK to leave someone stranded, in my case, in the rain in a strange city? In someone else's case it may be that they didn't have the financial ability to pay for a hotel room for the night, and they really would have been in a stressful, and possibly vulnerable situation. I'd be interested to know what anyone else thinks.

Caz3121

An unfortunate situation but not sure how Europcar can be liable for your hotel room because your train was late and you got lost getting to the office before they closed

brianposter

Forget the hotel room and concentrate on recovering your second rental payment (although you might go for the hotel charge if their case is weak enough). As a start you need to go over Europcar"s website to see how you were informed that the office would close at 5pm. If you were not informed, they have failed to perform the initial contract and are liable for the consequences.

I started a quick booking to take a car out at 5.30pm and there was no warning about  the office being closed so you might find something.

tightauldgit

teignmouthtrish said:

I booked, and paid for, a rental car to be picked up at 4.45pm from Europcar, as my train (6.5hr journey) was due to arrive in at 4.30pm ish. It actually arrived at 4.45 but Google maps said it was only a 5 minute walk so there shouldn't have been a problem getting there before the office shut. However, I took a wrong turning, then was misdirected and it seemed I might be late, so I tried the phone number on the bottom of the booking form, but it wasn't a direct line, and only offered to tell me about Europcar mobility, and their data protection policy etc,  so I gave up on that and just ran for it. However, it was 5.03pm when I got there, and the office was shut. A notice on the door gave a phone number, which was supposedly available until 6pm but no one answered it. I found a few other Europcar numbers, on my phone, with no joy. Without a car, I couldn't continue my journey and was forced to book into a hotel for the night. When I picked up my car the next morning, the staff in the Europcar office said that there never was anyone available after 5pm. I have contacted Europcar and asked for a refund of the £79 I paid for the hotel room, on the basis that they gave me no other option. They are refusing to pay, as they say that I 'made no attempt to contact them to say that I would be late'. Although I would like my money to be returned I think there is also a wider issue here - is it OK to leave someone stranded, in my case, in the rain in a strange city? In someone else's case it may be that they didn't have the financial ability to pay for a hotel room for the night, and they really would have been in a stressful, and possibly vulnerable situation. I'd be interested to know what anyone else thinks.

In short, yes it's OK (legally anyway). If they close at 5 and you turn up after 5 then that's your issue really. 

Turn it on it's head - I'm sure they get multiple no-shows every single day. At what point would it be OK for them to close and stop waiting for someone who hasn't come and hasn't communicated with them to say they will be coming? Should they wait indefinitely? Should they require staff to work extra hours at no notice to facilitate that? 

In the case of Europcar I would have expected them to be able to cope with an out of hours customer better than this so it certainly would be annoying and disappointing but I think legally there would be no comeback, if you were aware of the closing time of the office it's your responsibility to get there on time.  

Did they give you the car the next day? They may well have been within their rights to say your car was cancelled as a no show and you have to book again. 

brianposter

And as Tightauldgit is so negative, the note on the door implies that they should be available to 6pm so again they have breached the contract by failing to answer the telephone.You might need your telephone bill as evidence.

tightauldgit

brianposter said:

And as Tightauldgit is so negative, the note on the door implies that they should be available to 6pm so again they have breached the contract by failing to answer the telephone.You might need your telephone bill as evidence.

Simply not answering the phone is not a breach of contract - otherwise contracts would be breached a million times a day by every big company. If you could prove the number was not manned then you might have a stronger case. Even then it might not be seen as material since the note was only available to the customer AFTER they had shown up late anyway. 

It would certainly be evidence that you tried to contact them, but if the call takes place after the booking was due to be collected it certainly wouldn't counter their claim that you didn't tell them you were going to be late. 

What really matters is what information they were given during their booking and what the terms say about lateness but I'm not sure how you managed to get a quote from the office - as far as I can tell the poster hasn't told us where it happened. Maybe you mistook it for a continuation of the OP? If I do a random search for Europcar offices in stations then Bath says it's open to 6pm but Newcastle says the hours are 9-5pm

And then finally even if you could show that Europcar were in breach of the contract - it's highly unlikely they would be liable for consequential losses. All that it means is that you should have been able to cancel the contract and get your money back - but from the post it seems like they took the car the next morning and continued on their trip so no refund would be due.