Enterprise Car Hire Charges Dispute

prismbreak

Hello!  I wonder if anyone is able to advise me here!  We hired a van from Enterprise to move house. We had a week to move and originally took 2 days hire.  We had an accident on day one - total nightmare. First accident for my husband in over 30 years of driving.  We bought every damage waiver possible and the excess was £250.  We called them immediately and they told us to drive it back. We did, one day early.  The whole top of the Luton van fibre glass was smashed above the windscreen.  We were left with no van, no vehicle actually and had to walk off the forecourt back home and sort another one.  The next week we received a letter saying they would be investigating, and we may be liable for damages and quoted this passage from the T&C:

"As a result of your conduct, we are currently investigating the loss occurred to the vehicle that may

hold you in breach of our rental agreement. Your attention is drawn to Section 7a of the Rental

Agreement which explains our Damage Waiver will not apply should the contract be breached.

“Renter agrees that DW does not exempt Renter from liability for theft/loss of an electric vehicle’s

charging cable if not supported by a police crime reference or damage caused by: the use of incorrect

fuel; any breach of sections 3, 4 and 5 of this Rental Agreement or if Renter failed to take all

reasonable measures to look after and secure the Vehicle or the keys or any other device which

unlocks the Vehicle and/or enables the Vehicle to be started.” 

We assumed this was standard, as none of those scenarios related to us.  The send another email a couple of weeks ago that we completely missed due to gmail filtering. It didn't come from enterprise and the subject heading said "damage information"  However had we actually seen it, we'd have read that they are charging us over £10k and they tried to charge our card this morning!

Does anyone know any more about this type of scenario?

Many thanks in advance!

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

Sorry to hear OP

If you purchased any real insurance with the van that will be regulated and an official complaints procedure should be detailed. 

I think this should be the first step to follow.

They appear to be claiming you should not have damaged the van in the way you did (presumably it went through something that it was too high to fit under?), you'd have to check the insurance details to see exactly what is covered. 

For a 10K issue you might want to seek professional advice  

eskbanker

That quoted extract is poorly punctuated but are they effectively asserting that the vehicle was driven carelessly?  What actually happened that resulted in "The whole top of the Luton van fibre glass was smashed above the windscreen"?

Okell

Did you damage the roof of the van because you missed a height restriction?

I'm no expert on the intricacies of van hire but I believe I've read on other similar threads that no damage waiver covers this category of loss?  [Edit:  Having read @eskbanker's comment about careless driving, that rings a bell.  "Careless driving" might constitute a breach of contract and invalidate the insurance]

See what others say.

Okell

This is a similar thread from earlier this year.  (Assuming the OP has collided with something after missing a height restriction sign)

Also Enterprise

Enterprise Van Hire Damages - advice please! — MoneySavingExpert Forum

pramsay13

What was the accident?

I imagine you are covered for any normal accident that could occur while driving, but if they feel you have been negligent or using the vehicle for something other than usual purposes they will investigate and maybe try to charge which seems to be what has happened. 

Do you have legal protection on your house insurance? Might be worth giving them a call.