Shawna
2 years ago
AVIS and Ingham's Car Hire in Italy
We have had an appalling experience of hiring a car in Italy with AVIS at Bari Airport in June 2018. We had booked a fly drive holiday with Ingham's Italy in Puglia, with Lecce our first destination. Knowing from previous pressure selling episodes hiring cars in Europe we prepared by taking out a QUESTOR Excess Insurance policy a week before departure. On arrival we found an Ingham's representative available to help us obtain the car Inghams had pre-booked for us. She stood with my wife behind me stating that she wanted to make sure there were no issues with the booking. We were offered a range of additional services including Excess Insurance and Empty Petrol cover, but we refused, displaying our QUESTOR policy cover document. The AVIS agent sighed and went to work. Every dodge in the book was used for over 30 minutes to induce us to agree. We refused. A Italian man behind us in the queue exploded with rage at the agents 'bullying', and the Inghams rep did the same in Italian and English. We were bullied, misled, threatened, duped and manipulated for over 30 minutes by the AVIS agent. We thought the agent had given in, but he said that we still had to put our pin number into a credit card payment of 327EU or 拢288.61 which he said was not to be taken unless we failed to return the car. This fitted the description of 'Misleading and Aggressive Selling', in section 75 of the 2013 European Consumer Credit Act, because on returning home we found this sum had been deducted from our Credit Card Account. The agent had presented us with an array of documents to sign and in the process slipped in the one agreeing extra's we previously had declined. Despite all our pre-knowledge and planning to avoid such a deception we had been conned.
We immediately sought Inghams UK Customer Services support as they had booked the car with AVIS and asked that they obtain testimony from their representative who had been present. They refused to help us in any way, arguing it was a matter between us and AVIS. After 4 months of complaining to AVIS and seeking redress the ECRCS European arbitrators around car hire, gave the lack of independent witness testimony for declining to support our case. Evidence of our having existing QUESTOR Excess cover was ruled to be not compelling.
We had several other issues with Inghams arrangements on this holiday. The hotel in Lecce was changed a day before departure; the reason given (air conditioning breakdown) was an evidenced lie; the Ryanair travel Inghams booked, located us in separate seats; and Ryanair wanted over 拢40 to print out our Boarding Passes for the return journey. People should be very careful booking holidays with Inghams and car hire with AVIS. Both treat customers badly and their customer services are unhelpful. Between them they ruined our holiday, cost us a lot of money, and put us off ever hiring a car abroad again. My advice is to avoid these providers and to use your phone to record your interactions with car hire desk agents, as this may be the only form of evidence that might convince the ECRCS to uphold your complaints for Misleading and Aggressive selling. We see on Trust Pilot, Twitter, and BBCRadio 5 Consumer site, that many other customers have had similar or worse experiences with these two companies.
We have had an appalling experience of hiring a car in Italy with AVIS at Bari Airport in June 2018. We had booked a fly drive holiday with Ingham's Italy in Puglia, with Lecce our first destination. Knowing from previous pressure selling episodes hiring cars in Europe we prepared by taking out a QUESTOR Excess Insurance policy a week before departure. On arrival we found an Ingham's representative available to help us obtain the car Inghams had pre-booked for us. She stood with my wife behind me stating that she wanted to make sure there were no issues with the booking. We were offered a range of additional services including Excess Insurance and Empty Petrol cover, but we refused, displaying our QUESTOR policy cover document. The AVIS agent sighed and went to work. Every dodge in the book was used for over 30 minutes to induce us to agree. We refused. A Italian man behind us in the queue exploded with rage at the agents 'bullying', and the Inghams rep did the same in Italian and English. We were bullied, misled, threatened, duped and manipulated for over 30 minutes by the AVIS agent. We thought the agent had given in, but he said that we still had to put our pin number into a credit card payment of 327EU or 拢288.61 which he said was not to be taken unless we failed to return the car. This fitted the description of 'Misleading and Aggressive Selling', in section 75 of the 2013 European Consumer Credit Act, because on returning home we found this sum had been deducted from our Credit Card Account. The agent had presented us with an array of documents to sign and in the process slipped in the one agreeing extra's we previously had declined. Despite all our pre-knowledge and planning to avoid such a deception we had been conned.
We immediately sought Inghams UK Customer Services support as they had booked the car with AVIS and asked that they obtain testimony from their representative who had been present. They refused to help us in any way, arguing it was a matter between us and AVIS. After 4 months of complaining to AVIS and seeking redress the ECRCS European arbitrators around car hire, gave the lack of independent witness testimony for declining to support our case. Evidence of our having existing QUESTOR Excess cover was ruled to be not compelling.
We had several other issues with Inghams arrangements on this holiday. The hotel in Lecce was changed a day before departure; the reason given (air conditioning breakdown) was an evidenced lie; the Ryanair travel Inghams booked, located us in separate seats; and Ryanair wanted over 拢40 to print out our Boarding Passes for the return journey. People should be very careful booking holidays with Inghams and car hire with AVIS. Both treat customers badly and their customer services are unhelpful. Between them they ruined our holiday, cost us a lot of money, and put us off ever hiring a car abroad again. My advice is to avoid these providers and to use your phone to record your interactions with car hire desk agents, as this may be the only form of evidence that might convince the ECRCS to uphold your complaints for Misleading and Aggressive selling. We see on Trust Pilot, Twitter, and BBCRadio 5 Consumer site, that many other customers have had similar or worse experiences with these two companies.
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Stewart
2 years ago
Inghams and AVIS Car Hire in Italy
We have had an appalling experience of hiring a car in Italy with AVIS at Bari Airport in June. We had booked a fly drive holiday with Inghams Italy in Puglia, with Lecce our first destination. Knowing from previous pressure selling episodes hiring cars in Europe we prepared by taking out a QUESTOR Excess Insurance policy a week before departure. On arrival we found an Inghams representative available to help us obtain the car Inghams had pre-booked for us. She stood with my wife behind me stating that she wanted to make sure there were no issues with the booking. We were offered a range of additional services including Excess Insurance and Empty Petrol cover, but we refused displaying our QUESTOR policy cover document. The AVIS agent sighed and went to work. Every dodge in the book was used for over 30 minutes to induce us to agree. We refused. A Italian man behind us in the queue exploded with rage at the agents 'bullying', and the Inghams rep did the same in Italian and English. We were bullied, misled, threatened, duped and manipulated for over 30 minutes by the AVIS agent. We thought the agent had given in, but he said that we still had to put our pin number into a credit card payment of 327EU or 拢288.61 which he said was not to be taken unless we failed to return the car. This fitted the description of 'Misleading and Aggressive Selling', in section 75 of the 2013 European Consumer Credit Act, because on returning home we found this sum had been deducted from our Credit Card Account. The agent had presented us with an array of documents to sign and in the process slipped in the one agreeing extra's we previously had declined. Despite all our pre-knowledge and planning to avoid such a deception we had been conned.
We immediately sought Inghams UK Customer Services support as they had booked the car with AVIS and asked that they obtain testimony from their representative who had been present. They refused to help us in any way, arguing it was a matter between us and AVIS. After 4 months of complaining to AVIS and seeking redress the ECRCS European arbitrators around car hire, gave the lack of independent witness testimony for declining to support our case. Evidence of our having existing QUESTOR Excess cover was ruled to be not compelling.
We had several other issues with Inghams arrangements on this holiday. The hotel in Lecce was changed a day before departure; the reason given (air conditioning breakdown) was an evidenced lie; the Ryanair travel Inghams booked, located us in separate seats; and Ryanair wanted over 拢40 to print out our Boarding Passes for the return journey. People should be very careful booking holidays with Inghams and car hire with AVIS. Both treat customers with disdain and their customer services are dreadful. Between them they ruined our holiday, cost us a lot of money, and put us off ever hiring a car abroad again. My advice is to avoid these providers and to use your phone to record your interactions with car hire desk agents, as this may be the only form of evidence that might convince the ECRCS to uphold your complaints for Misleading and Aggressive selling. We see on Trust Pilot, Twitter, and BBCRadio 5 Consumer site, that many other customers have had similar or worse experiences with these two companies.
We have had an appalling experience of hiring a car in Italy with AVIS at Bari Airport in June. We had booked a fly drive holiday with Inghams Italy in Puglia, with Lecce our first destination. Knowing from previous pressure selling episodes hiring cars in Europe we prepared by taking out a QUESTOR Excess Insurance policy a week before departure. On arrival we found an Inghams representative available to help us obtain the car Inghams had pre-booked for us. She stood with my wife behind me stating that she wanted to make sure there were no issues with the booking. We were offered a range of additional services including Excess Insurance and Empty Petrol cover, but we refused displaying our QUESTOR policy cover document. The AVIS agent sighed and went to work. Every dodge in the book was used for over 30 minutes to induce us to agree. We refused. A Italian man behind us in the queue exploded with rage at the agents 'bullying', and the Inghams rep did the same in Italian and English. We were bullied, misled, threatened, duped and manipulated for over 30 minutes by the AVIS agent. We thought the agent had given in, but he said that we still had to put our pin number into a credit card payment of 327EU or 拢288.61 which he said was not to be taken unless we failed to return the car. This fitted the description of 'Misleading and Aggressive Selling', in section 75 of the 2013 European Consumer Credit Act, because on returning home we found this sum had been deducted from our Credit Card Account. The agent had presented us with an array of documents to sign and in the process slipped in the one agreeing extra's we previously had declined. Despite all our pre-knowledge and planning to avoid such a deception we had been conned.
We immediately sought Inghams UK Customer Services support as they had booked the car with AVIS and asked that they obtain testimony from their representative who had been present. They refused to help us in any way, arguing it was a matter between us and AVIS. After 4 months of complaining to AVIS and seeking redress the ECRCS European arbitrators around car hire, gave the lack of independent witness testimony for declining to support our case. Evidence of our having existing QUESTOR Excess cover was ruled to be not compelling.
We had several other issues with Inghams arrangements on this holiday. The hotel in Lecce was changed a day before departure; the reason given (air conditioning breakdown) was an evidenced lie; the Ryanair travel Inghams booked, located us in separate seats; and Ryanair wanted over 拢40 to print out our Boarding Passes for the return journey. People should be very careful booking holidays with Inghams and car hire with AVIS. Both treat customers with disdain and their customer services are dreadful. Between them they ruined our holiday, cost us a lot of money, and put us off ever hiring a car abroad again. My advice is to avoid these providers and to use your phone to record your interactions with car hire desk agents, as this may be the only form of evidence that might convince the ECRCS to uphold your complaints for Misleading and Aggressive selling. We see on Trust Pilot, Twitter, and BBCRadio 5 Consumer site, that many other customers have had similar or worse experiences with these two companies.