Advice on car hire dispute

I   would  get a  New  credit card  if  it  not  to  awkward  for  you.  Or  I  return  to Car  hire desk at Airport   walk  in   to  Manager  office  and inform  him you  will  NOT leave  until  it  sorted. If   Police  get  involved  they  have to  listen  to both  sides.  Can imagine  the  reaction  of  waiting  customers. Just  be  brave 

If they take it off your credit then contact your credit card supplier. They are normally very good at sorting things out like this.

Sorry but we are in UK now, so can't do that. Can they still access my credit card some 3 weks later? I didn't mention the car had 13 scratches marked all on the same side of the car on pick up, but they say that one is new!!! 

I had a similar thing in Italy a few years ago with a scamming car hire company. On returning the car, the girl who dealt with returns literally got down on her hands and knees to inspect the car body close up until she found a micro scratch, nothing to do with us, and triumphally said "you've done this damage, I have to report it to my boss, you'll be getting a bill".

We denied doing anything, pointed out you needed a microscope to see the speck she was pointing at, took photos of the alleged damage, and reported the incident to our independent insurer. Sure enough the bill arrived for 450€, charged to my CC, plus photos they claimed were of the damage, which showed they'd gouged it with a scewdriver or something to make it look bad. Unfortunately for them, their photos were date stamped a few days after ours!

Our insurance company told me to advise them we were not paying a clearly fraudulent claim and we were reporting them to the credit card company. This we did, the credit card company clearly got heavy with them, because a few weeks later the full amount was refunded to my CC account.

The car was hired in Bergamo Airport but the repair bill came from some garage in Palermo! Tells you something, huh?

They were still e-mailing me claims for payment two or three years later, which I obviously ignored. I wanted to tell them where to stuff their bill but I didn't fancy waking up one morning with a horses head in the bed.

The moral: get your CC company involved. They know all about damaged hire car scams.

Cancelling the credit card won't work.

Leaving out who's right or who's wrong it's all part of the one contract so they can claim money from the card used even if cancelled.

There's a lot of useful info on the subject in the guides.

Thanks for this, so because they have my credit card details they could in effect take money from it anytime. Regardless of right or wrong? 

Unfortunately yes. It would have to be in relation to the particular hire contract though.

We'll try to send these photos again but we're in Alicante 19fh June so it may be a case of walking in the office and demanding justice. 

Even when u check car out and in they can't see anything in the dark car park. 

Will never use them again

Have you spoken to your credit card supplier?

We had something similar with Goldcar a few years ago & I rang the bank as soon as the attempted claim was received by email.

I bank with NatWest &, while I can't speak for other banks, they were excellent about it. They blocked the attempt to take any further money & refunded me the withheld deposit without any fuss.

This scam is as old as the hills (especially at Alicante airport) & the UK banks are well aware of it.

NatWest's advice to me was to ignore it & not worry because the hire car companies are renowned for chancing their arm like this.