Scratch on rental car

tea and coffee

In Spain and I've managed to scratch the rental car. It's not deep and it's on the tiny panel/strip underneath the passenger door (rear)- probably off a kerb.
The rental co indicated at time of hire they take the full excess (€1350) do the repairs and refund you the difference. I'm a bit worried that once they take that money off my card, I'll never see it again. That the repairs will be 1349.99 although it's likely a couple hundred euro max.
Should i try find a panel beater here or would you "trust" the hire company (Europcar as agents of Alamo) ?

tea and coffee

Photos hope they show

mikeybrennan

fix it yourself before you bring it back

ARGINITE

How big is the scratch?

Had a similar issue with a rental a few months ago where I got a minor scratch from a aluminium pipe a truck in front of me lost.

Cleaned of the silver mark made by the pipe and then polished up the scratch and the renal company didn't even notice.

If it's minor do the same and keep quite.

maidhc

I picked up a fine dent on a rental car this summer. It looked to be from bad parking by another car.I had the excess covered through Axa but didn't really feel like going down that route. Handed the car back, said nothing, and no one noticed.

Toyotafanboi

In work we would deal with most of the bigger car rental firms on a daily basis.

I have yet to see a rep for the rental company checking over a car when taking it back. Unless the car has been in a serious accident or has something obviously missing, they won't give a toss about small-ish dents or scratches.

Cerco

Toyotafanboi wrote: »

In work we would deal with most of the bigger car rental firms on a daily basis.

I have yet to see a rep for the rental company checking over a car when taking it back. Unless the car has been in a serious accident or has something obviously missing, they won't give a toss about small-ish dents or scratches.

Not so with Enterprise. I returned a car to them and the rep spent about ten
mins going over it. Found a tiny mark on front fender. I suspect it was there when I got it. and I had full liability cover anyway.

Sam Kade

Cerco wrote: »

Not so with Enterprise. I returned a car to them and the rep spent about ten
mins going over it. Found a tiny mark on front fender. I suspect it was there when I got it. and I had full liability cover anyway.

Go home Yank.

tea and coffee

Thanks everyone.
The rep spent about 10 mins checking the car with us before we signed off on it. He even had a measuring tape for scratches. He was pretty exact. I've never had this on previous rentals in other countries.

mikeybrennan

take your own photographs when hiring ,for rebuttal

shovel2

fix it yoursdelf they are dangerous.

biko

I was in Africa a while back and someone had scratched my car while parked.
It came out of my liability, 50 euro or so

mfceiling

Try and find a motor factors and buy some coloured "T-cut".

Get the car washed and then gently polish the cut with the coloured T-cut. What colour is the car? If it's black or white a tiny touch up pen of paint might hide it.

Toyotafanboi

Cerco wrote: »

Not so with Enterprise. I returned a car to them and the rep spent about ten
mins going over it. Found a tiny mark on front fender. I suspect it was there when I got it. and I had full liability cover anyway.

I was actually going to name enterprise as the company that cared the least.

bear1

Back in January we went to Mauritius and I rented a car as well without the full insurance.
Towards the end I noticed where we were parked at the hotel that both sides of the doors had scratches as if someone had hit them when opening their doors.
Had to go back to the airport so what I did was buy a can of coke and pour some onto the scratches.
Then I got some of the dust and dirt from the road and threw it randomly around the car and onto the scratches so that it would just seem like random dirt as I didn't believe they would wash the car first to see if there was anything.
Brought it back and they inspected it and signed off all ok.
Maybe try this op.

mikeybrennan

bear1 wrote: »

Back in January we went to Mauritius and I rented a car as well without the full insurance.
Towards the end I noticed where we were parked at the hotel that both sides of the doors had scratches as if someone had hit them when opening their doors.
Had to go back to the airport so what I did was buy a can of coke and pour some onto the scratches.
Then I got some of the dust and dirt from the road and threw it randomly around the car and onto the scratches so that it would just seem like random dirt as I didn't believe they would wash the car first to see if there was anything.
Brought it back and they inspected it and signed off all ok.
Maybe try this op.

not too sure about this idea

bear1

mikeybrennan wrote: »

not too sure about this idea

It's risky but it worked for me anyway.
If try and fix it first if I were the op but if time isn't on their side I'd try anything to keep the excess.
I only saw mine the day we were leaving.

Murt10

I backed into a pebble dashed wall in Spain earlier this year and damaged the paintwork on the rear bumper. There were scrapes and scratches on the other part of the bumper.

The company took E200 off my credit card for my trouble. I have car hire excess but didn't bother putting in a claim against it.

Anyway, they were looking for E230 for fully comp insurance in the first place. So I regard myself as having saved E30