Thanks Eamon

The more people who unearth the con artists the better.

One day someone will have enough time and money to test these companies (and their industry) in court. You would think that it was up to them to prove that you damaged the car, rather than prove that you didn't.

I'm left wondering how they came about this figure for the bumper damage. A replacement would be hundreds more. A load of old tosh, isn't it?

Eamon next time you book car hire try www.economycarhire.com they are a UK company but they use Portuguese hire companies at Faro, they have no excess on their insurance, apart from damage to windscreen, tyres and underside of car which is normal with every car hire company. The petrol situation is you put the same amount in as was in the tank when you picked it up. They only take your credit card details for petrol purposes. The good thing is that,if you do have a problem with the car hire place in Portugal you only need to ring the UK number of economycar hire when you are back in the UK with your complaint and they will sort it out for you, and if you have a valid case they will re-imburse you.Look at their website and give them a try next time.

Eamon next time you book car hire try www.economycarhire.com they are a UK company but they use Portuguese hire companies at Faro, they have no excess on their insurance, apart from damage to windscreen, tyres and underside of car which is normal with every car hire company. The petrol situation is you put the same amount in as was in the tank when you picked it up. They only take your credit card details for petrol purposes. The good thing is that,if you do have a problem with the car hire place in Portugal you only need to ring the UK number of economycar hire when you are back in the UK with your complaint and they will sort it out for you, and if you have a valid case they will re-imburse you.Look at their website and give them a try next time.

Sorry got the double post, but website said the post had failed first time.

Thanks,Jayjan, I will remember for next time. If I was slightly down on petrol I would not mind and would of just accepted it and not bothered with posting my concerns.But what I did not say in my rant was that the car was not completlty full when I picked it up.

Thanks again, Eamon.

Thanks,MorecheeseGromit?

I also hope more people come forward and expose these type of cons.They have never even sent any proof of anything, all they did was take the money out,it would not take long to get a tidy profit if a little bit extra was taken from every other person. Maybe only a small amount, enough to send an e-mail of complaint, but not to take it any further.

Eamon

Eamon,The most important thing you need to do if you consider using economycarhire next time, is make sure you read the terms and conditions of all the Portuguese car hire companies they use as they all differ slightly on petrol, credit card issues & out of hours pick up charges.

We had the same petrol situation as you many years ago at Malaga Airport,we filled the tank up to full, but when we got to the car drop off point there wasnt anyone there to take the car from us. We had previously been told if no-one was there when we dropped it off to put the car keys on top of the front tyre and it would be ok, so we did just that. On arrival home and on receiving our credit card statement they had charged us £28 for petrol, we complained to the credit card company but they couldnt do anything,and it was pointless to try and get it back from the car hire company as it was our word against theirs. I think its disgusting that these companies can do this and as you say they must make a lot of money over a 12 month period.

I was very sorry to read about your car rental problems. As an apartment owner on the Club Albufeira for the past five years, I refer many holiday-makers to a small and friendly rental company at Lagorent.com

I have never ever received any complaints and I use this company myself when visiting Portugal. They are quite happy if the car is left in any space of their two rows in the P4 car park at the airport - they will even deliver the car to an apartment on the Club Albufeira for some chosen days of a holiday period.

That's really bad that things like that happen...horrible! I've never heard about Autorent but I'll keep away of them...

I usually use autocarhire.net ...I recommend it because I had no bad experience with them. I always pay a full insurance to avoid problems like yours...

I'm really sorry for those like you.

Hope I'll never have such a bad experience!

With regard to that darn small print, better that people use a recognised "broker". We use holidayautos and (touch wood) haven't had any problems as yet. Whichever rental company you end up using, the contract is the same. Our preference has been to use autojardim.

I'd be interested to hear any comments on the views made by jaylan. When paying by credit card I have always been under the impression that the burden of proof lay with the vendor (the rental company in this case). Ive used this solution in the past - all be it on a completely different matter - and the credit card company insisted that the vendor prove that they were right, and I was wrong. Unfortunately jaylan may well be right.

Any views, experiences, lawyers out there?