UK resident refused car rental at UK airport

MyRealNameToo

Jaysaab said:

user1977 said:

Alternatively, spend less than the £300 difference to travel somewhere else and fly back in...

I must admit that it was only after we left the airport the thought of booking the cheapest flight into Stansted may solve the problem.
All they would have wanted to see was the booking, not proof we were ever actually on the flight.
The step daughter has given up and is car sharing for the week.

or just give them a flight number that landed a little while ago... doubt they will be checking

Mr.Generous

I once booked a car pickup at Teterboro airport, New York, because it was about half the price of anywhere in the city. Got an Uber there from Manhattan only to find car hire unmanned and no one to help us. The airport reception (small private airport) just found the paperwork and keys and off we went. On return we found they had cancelled our rental because we didn't provide a flight in tail number for Teterboro, a condition of hire. Oops too late. They just shrugged and took the car back. Aparrently we shouldn't have been admitted to the airport by gate security, we just told them we were there to pick up a car and they waved us through. Funny how it's cheaper for those who can afford a private plane!! 

Jaysaab

Car_54 said:

Jaysaab said:

My step daughter's clutch has gone on her car which she uses to commute to work.
No garage can repair it for a week so we looked into renting her a car.
The few rental firms we have on the high street like Enterprise wanted over £500 for something like a Fiat 500 or Toyota Aygo.
I went on a price comparison site and well known firms could offer the same car for under £200.
We live near Stansted Airport so paid for the car online and set off to collect it.
When we got to the airport they refused to rent the car as we had not just got off a flight and could not provide flight details.
So they are happy to rent to someone that may have just had a 12 hour flight and not used to UK roads but not to a UK resident with a clean licence.
This seems so unfair and once again we are being ripped off.

I can understand you're being upset, particularly since you'd booked and paid for it online. However, I don't understand "ripped off" - didn't you get a refund?

Ripped off as in can only hire a car on the high
 street for a week for £500 when they are renting them to people arriving on flights at airports for £200, why should we be forced to pay £300 more.
And no we don't have our refund yet as they are investigating why we were allowed to book online with no flight details when the error is on them.

Jaysaab

saajan_12 said:

Which rental company is it? I doubt its an assessment of who's the bigger risk.. but instead part of the contract with the airport. Passenger tickets will have a built in fee for the airport, which they don't get for walk ins and I'd guess Stansted don't want to lease out space to rental companies without getting that fee. 

Other airports in the world do manage this by charging an 'airport premium' on rentals, which one way or another increases the lease the rental co pay to the airport instead. I've certainly hired cars from airports when abroad without a flight in, because its still cheaper than the downtown locations which have limited fleets. 

Unfortunately if it was part of the rental conditions then you may be restricted from renting there. I tried a random company (Europcar) and it was indeed part of the 'additional info', that hirers must show a flight in. Check if yours has the same. 

My partner rented it through https://www.economybookings.com.
She even rung them to confirm there was a car available at the airport for her.

Mildly_Miffed

Jaysaab said:

saajan_12 said:

Which rental company is it? I doubt its an assessment of who's the bigger risk.. but instead part of the contract with the airport. Passenger tickets will have a built in fee for the airport, which they don't get for walk ins and I'd guess Stansted don't want to lease out space to rental companies without getting that fee. 

Other airports in the world do manage this by charging an 'airport premium' on rentals, which one way or another increases the lease the rental co pay to the airport instead. I've certainly hired cars from airports when abroad without a flight in, because its still cheaper than the downtown locations which have limited fleets. 

Unfortunately if it was part of the rental conditions then you may be restricted from renting there. I tried a random company (Europcar) and it was indeed part of the 'additional info', that hirers must show a flight in. Check if yours has the same. 

My partner rented it through https://www.economybookings.com.
She even rung them to confirm there was a car available at the airport for her.

Ringing Economy Bookings wouldn't do anything useful, because they aren't who she's renting the car from. So I presume she phoned one of the car rental firms themselves.
https://www.stanstedairport.com/at-the-airport/car-rental/
Six firms have counters at the airport. There are plenty of others who come up in the comparison results, because they're acting as intermediaries.

So if I search on that platform for next Monday to Sunday...
Airport - £115 for six days
Stortford, Harlow, Chelmsford, even Cambridge - no cars available.

If I search a bit wider...
Kayak - Stortford, £86, excluding airport - and that's a two minute search...

WellKnownSid

Certainly for at least 20 years there has been something in the small print about having a flight number on many sites.  Of the fifty or sixty times I've hired at an airport without flying in I've always provided one on the form, turned up with "hand luggage" and only asked twice I believe to confirm it - never asked for an actual boarding pass.

Presumably this is nothing more than marketing information for the hire company because there will be a kickback somewhere based upon volume.

user1977

WellKnownSid said:

Presumably this is nothing more than marketing information for the hire company because there will be a kickback somewhere based upon volume.

And also helps them know whether you're delayed/cancelled (not sure if it would be awkward to explain turning up before "your" flight has landed...)

WellKnownSid

user1977 said:

WellKnownSid said:

Presumably this is nothing more than marketing information for the hire company because there will be a kickback somewhere based upon volume.

And also helps them know whether you're delayed/cancelled (not sure if it would be awkward to explain turning up before "your" flight has landed...)

“So glad I came in last night on the EasyJet, I hear it’s been chaos this morning” 😏