Excessive charge for a puncture repair on a hire car.

Today chatting to a lady, she was very upset, had just returned a hire car in uk after 3 days use, and there was a small nail in tyre,tyre still inflated,i drove a car for a few hundred miles with a nail in it, with no problems,but rental company instantly deducted £500 from her card, and said she would be refunded what ever the total was, minus the cost of a new tyre and fitting,not even a repair, within the next 90 days.

She had also paid a £50 deposit when picking up car,so shes out of pocket by £550, this has left her with no available cash in the bank, and she had to borrow money to buy some food etc.

The rental company is part of a national chain, and the hire car was part of her full AA cover free of hire charges, for 3 days.

Sure most if not all rental companies have minimum £500 excess.

Why would a hire company fix a tyre – not worth their risk !

how did they even spot it if the tyre was still up, never thought they would check them over that well to spot a small nail.

Take it up with CC (I’d expect you might be able to refuse the £500 hold)

Why would a hire company fix a tyre not hump any customer as much as they actually can? – not worth their risk !

FTFY

the hire car was part of her full AA cover free of hire charges, for 3 days.

What does this mean?

What does this mean?

It means that the AA arranged and paid for the hire car under her breakdown cover, but she still pays for any additional charges, including any damages/excess.

I looked at the t&cs out of interest and that is indeed the case.

But yes, CC company is the way to go on this.

So they’ve taken £500 off her credit card which has left her no cash in the bank? That’s not how credit cards work (at least not until you have to pay the bill).

But yes £500 does seem a bit steep for a tyre.

but rental company instantly deducted £500 from her card, and said she would be refunded what ever the total was, minus the cost of a new tyre and fitting,not even a repair, within the next 90 days.

That is excessive …

I have noticed rental places very carefully checking the sidewalls of tyres for damage – and so always make sure I do the same on pickup.

A nail in the tyre is taking the piss though isn’t it? As a driver, how can you conceivably avoid that happening? Surely comes under wear and tear rather than damage.

It does also smell a bit fishy: are they really claiming that they are routinely checking all cars for this on return….. and so (by extension) the customer needs to do the same on pickup? Sounds like a ruse to get free replacement tires for their cars.

I would be contesting the CC charge on the basis that there is no way of knowing whether the damage was there when she got the car – as the tyres were not inspectable. What was she supposed to do…. ask them to put it up on a hoist?

Regarding the amount being excessive, they are probably charging for the thing being off the road for a day while it’s fixed.

I honestly don’t see what’s wrong. She borrowed a car off someone. They said it would be £500 excess to borrow the car, which would be taken if any damage found, and then refunded less the cost of any damage up to 90 days later. She agreed to the T&C’s

Does make you think that you need to check tyres for nails though when hiring a car.

I certainly wouldn’t want to hire a car with a nail in the tyre, or a repaired tyre

When was the nail spotted? On return?
I can think of two occasions in almost 40 years of driving when I’ve seen a screw in a tyre while walking around a car, and both times it was a front tyre and on lock. I doubt that you’d spot a nail unless it was a clout
If it was spotted after the lady had left then it could have been picked up on the drive to the wash-bay and comprehensive vehicle check
Do you get legal help with AA membership? That would be an ironic use 🙂

Assuming the nail thing isn’t just a scam then what the company has done seems OK to me and would have been in the T&Cs. If the eventual bill is more than a couple of hundred quid then I’d be complaining. That said they might end up having to replace both tyres if fronts and there was a decent amount of wear already on them, not sure what they’d charge then

It’s a scam method used by dodgy hire companies.

Whether it is in this case is the question.

She should get all over social media with this.

and said she would be refunded what ever the total was, minus the cost of a new tyre and fitting,not even a repair, within the next 90 days.

this will be a catch-all. Its not going to take 90 days to resolve repairing or replacing a tyre – that car is going to be back out on the road the next day and the costs due to your friend will be apparent straight away – if she’d not been refunded  “£500-minus-spencible-price-of-tyre” (actual £550 I guess – was that £50 supposed to be refunded?) within a few days then kick up a fuss as they’ll have no good reason (their 90 days T&C are not a good reason) to hold the money.

The 90 days thing is just because an issue could be much more difficult to resolve. The same policy covers procedures for  a puncture and a major RTA . So for instance if if it was an incident involving a third party, even if its  a minor bump, a claim could take a long time to sort out . The T&Cs have to cover all  those eventualities but they’re not an excuse to dick anyone around.

She should get all over social media with this.

Gosh, the nuclear option.

Does make you think that you need to check tyres for nails though when hiring a car.

How can you do a proper check without at least jacking up the corners? You can’t really see enough of the rears without doing that.

How can you do a proper check without at least jacking up the corners?

They don’t jack up all the corners when you return it – have a look as well as you can when you collect. They look as well as they can when you return.

Worth keeping in mind that tyres often aren’t covered by the insurance anyway so even if you have a damage waiver policy  to cover the excess you might still have to pay up for tyre damage

I certainly wouldn’t want to hire a car with a nail in the tyre, or a repaired tyre

Ha. This is almost stereo typical of a descriptor I use for anal people at work….

“The sort of person who gets a puncture on the way to the officd and fixes it by replacing all 5 tires on the car”

Love all the smarmy gits on here who like to write stuff on threads like this to the sum total of “well seems reasonable she should have read the T&C’s. Snark snark snark”

It’s patently unreasonable when a tubeless repair is about £30. Are you really going to tell me that is is environmentally sensible or even morally reasonable to throw away a whole new tyre when it can be permanently and painlessly repaired in about 30 seconds? Next they’ll be telling you they need to replace all four tires to ensure even wear.

I’ve also always wondered about how car hire firms have the audacity to start asking you about whether you want roadside assistance when you hire a car. If they rent you a car, they should be responsible for it starting

As Rawls put it, Justice is Fairness. A concept that seems increasingly foreign in the UK.

Good luck with it.

I certainly wouldn’t want to hire a car with a nail in the tyre, or a repaired tyre

Ha. This is almost stereo typical of a descriptor I use for anal people at work….

“The sort of person who gets a puncture on the way to the officd and fixes it by replacing all 5 tires on the car”

hahahaha made me laugh out loud. +1

Crap service from the AA not to include excess insurance on their “free” car hire policy. The one time I hired a car it was only a few quid extra per day for zero excess (tyres included!)

Also not really sure about the “no cash left in the bank” thing unless she put the deposit/excess on her debit card and has no overdraft or credit card and had exactly £550 left in her account (which is possible I guess)

which is possible I guess

Yeah – its a possible but not probable. I mean who would really be inconvenienced by having £500 taken off them for an indefinite amount of time. Certainly not anyone I know.

It’s patently unreasonable when a tubeless repair is about £30. 

I think its unreasonable that they won’t have a proper repair done aswell. But I’d imagine for a compact type car the tyres going to cost £100 give or take, so the lady’s going to get £400+ refunded.

Love all the smarmy gits on here who like to write stuff on threads like this to the sum total of “well seems reasonable she should have read the T&C’s. Snark snark snark”

Well she should have. We all should but we generally don’t. We enter into agreements like this completely ignorant about what we’re signing up for. 99.9% of the time we get away with it, but sometimes we get unlucky. The reality is a hire car company is not going to pay for damage (and it is damage…not wear and tear)…that is a risk borne by the person renting the car – when you hire a car you take the risk, a bit like picking up damage in a car park…which is why they try to upsell the insurances which most of us decline. The hire car company wont want to repair the tyre…assuming it was possible to repair in the first place (in all likelihood it wasn’t as they rarely are), as they don’t want to take the risk on the repair -imagine if a tyre blew, car crashed and family killed and it came out in the press the tyre was only repaired from a previous puncture….the press would be all over that like a bad rash and the damage to the companies reputation would be too great. Also they just farm out any repairs to the cars to external suppliers/vendors against a standard workscope and tariff because that reduces their risk, simplifies their business, reduces cost and enables them to offer competitive prices.

But to be fair i’m also surprised they spotted it. Whenever I return a hire car they give the car a cursory walk-around inspection and check only what they can see. They’ve have little or no chance spotting a nail in the tyre unless it was right on the outer edge of the tyre and happened to be at the top half so visible…and if that was the case the tyre wouldn’t be repairable anyway.

Love all the smarmy gits on here who like to write stuff on threads like this to the sum total of “well seems reasonable she should have read the T&C’s. Snark snark snark”

This kind of pathetic point-scoring goes with the territory and it’s why this place has a certain reputation in the wider MTB community.

But to be fair i’m also surprised they spotted it. Whenever I return a hire car they give the car a cursory walk-around inspection and check only what they can see. They’ve have little or no chance spotting a nail in the tyre

Yes…. it’s almost unbelievable isn’t it?

Well she should have. We all should but we generally don’t. We enter into agreements like this completely ignorant about what we’re signing up for. 99.9% of the time we get away with it, but sometimes we get unlucky

I whinged about a £56 admin fee for passing me on a fine for not paying the Dartford crossing, said I never saw it in their t&cs and it was excessive. They sent me a copy of my signature right on top of the charge, and I hadn’t even noticed it at the time.

(I still think it’s excessive, especially as Dart charge waived the fine and just charged me for the crossing).

It’s patently unreasonable when a tubeless repair is about £30. Are you really going to tell me that is is environmentally sensible or even morally reasonable to throw away a whole new tyre when it can be permanently and painlessly repaired in about 30 seconds? Next they’ll be telling you they need to replace all four tires to ensure even wear.

Well depends where the nail was, if outside of the central belt then no I wouldn’t expect them to repair as you shouldn’t (possibly even not legal/safe to do so). My reference to T&Cs was more how the £500 deduction would be made up front then the balance refunded, and if she’d paid for the hire with a credit card and not a debit card then she wouldn’t have been left unable to buy food.

The whole car hire industry is a shambles, especially regarding customer service but this is well-known, although that doesn’t make it right (and I guess it’s unfair to expect everyone to be aware of car hire company reputations and take steps to mitigate it in advance).

If they charge for a new tyre, demand to take the old one away and sell it on Ebay or alike! 😉

For the nail to have been noticed, I’d guess it’s been some where very obvious, like sticking out the sidewall (in which case it’s in a non-repairable area for a ‘minor’ repair, and very few places would have the equipment to fix it). Or we’re not getting the full story, and it’s more than just a nail…

I’ve got no idea what the official line is regards tyre damage on hire vehicles, especially punctures (it would be very hard to prove when a puncture actually happened, as nails/screws can potentially be in a tyre for a substantial length of time before being noticed) but if you want the official line, check the BVRLA website (British Vehicle Rental and Leasing Association if you must know), as they publish all the guides members should be following.

Was it the gallardo or murcielago , hired?

https://www.blackcircles.com/tyres/cars/lamborghini/gallardo

Love all the smarmy gits on here who like to write stuff on threads like this to the sum total of “well seems reasonable she should have read the T&C’s. Snark snark snark”

If you cant afford the tyres for your supercar ,don’t drive it.

I’m deeply sceptical of the ‘nail in tyre’ thing with hire cars. We’ve had 2 people in the office stung by this, both were told about the nail by post after the car was returned so neither actually saw the damage. In the same period, there’s been just 1 nail in a company care tyre despite the company cars doing over ten times the mileage. I appreciate this is not proof but I’ve heard of too many cases to be reasonable.

The final cost will be more than the tyre as they’ll bill for the time the car wasn’t available to hire as well. That could be several days hire charge on top of the tire.

Yes…. it’s almost unbelievable isn’t it?

Really? assuming this was one of the big rental car companies are you suggesting they’re deliberately scamming her? I struggle to believe this. It is inevitable they would get caught and the negative press and following fall out would do them great reputational harm. Could be a rogue branch manager scamming people I guess in cahoots with a local dodgy tyre supplier, but again these big companies will have all their service and maintenance contracts centrally negotiated and arranged so the local branch manager would probably not be involved. One for the conspiracy theory bucket i’m afraid along with the flat earthers, moon landing sceptics, climate change deniers and the autism causing vaccinations lot.

“The sort of person who gets a puncture on the way to the officd and fixes it by replacing all 5 tires on the car”

Like a colleague of mine who was persuaded to change complete car as the Bluetooth in car didn’t work….

are you suggesting they’re deliberately scamming her?

Do you know much about hire car ripoffs?

Really? assuming this was one of the big rental car companies are you suggesting they’re deliberately scamming her? I struggle to believe this. It is inevitable they would get caught and the negative press and following fall out would do them great reputational harm

Hahahahahahahahahahah…..

Oh wait….. were you being serious?

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/10/01/europcar-repair-charge-victims-set-receive-38m-compensation

Yes I smell a rat here. As the car hire firms are now being exposed for the obvious ripoffs they have to become more devious.

A friend was done for a missing tyre inflator, it’s a gas bottle on a Kia. They never checked, funnily enough their son is a lawyer so wrote to said company.

Said company refunded the money. They were billed 450 for it, i wonder how many people just paid up. Actually you have preauthorised the deduction so cannot challenge it.

The dodgy hire car lot know they are no dodgy ground hence soon as they get a legal letter they roll over.

This particular outfit have terrible reviews for similar behaviour.

The final cost will be more than the tyre as they’ll bill for the time the car wasn’t available to hire as well. That could be several days hire charge on top of the tire.

I don’t think this is true, your liable for the repair not some presumed mythical future earnings.
Once the repairs are done you are entitled to fully itemized bill. Which no doubt will include an admin fee 🙄

… are you suggesting they’re deliberately scamming her?… One for the conspiracy theory bucket i’m afraid along with the flat earthers, moon landing sceptics, climate change deniers and the autism causing vaccinations lot.

Yep, believing a car hire company might engage in a bit of sharp practice is exactly like those things.

There is a bit of a difference between using a mechanism to inflate a repair bill ie. Europecar and totally inventing a repair. In fact a pretty big difference. One you get to pay some money back, the other could lesd to criminal charges. Even so itbwould be stupid to say it’s never happened 🙁