National Car Rental
Reviews and Complaints

Rental Agreement # [protected]

I rented a vehicle from National Rental Car in Philadelphia on 20 July 2016. When I arrived late in the evening, the attendant told me they did not have the SUV I reserved, but offered a full-sized car since I am an Emerald Executive member. I did my customary walk around (in the dark) saw nothing obvious and left. I drove straight to my hotel, went to meetings the following day less than 1/2 a mile a way and returned the vehicle less than 48 hours later on 22 July 2016.

When I returned the vehicle, the technician immediately went to the right rocker panel and told me there was damage. How he knew to go immediately to that spot is still a mystery to me since I actually had to get down on my knees and look UNDER the car to see it, is a mystery to me. He proceeded to tell me I had to have driven up on a curb or something to do the damage. The manager, Karmar Williams was very polite and said that if the cameras at the exit captured the damage when I left, I would not be responsible for it. The problem is after being showed the cameras, I do not see how it could capture it because none of them are low enough to see it. Even the manager Kamar agreed he could not see the damage when we walked around the vehicle together.

I was never even in a parking lot or road that I could have caused that damage, the parking lots were large and I didn't even park next to a curb or parking block. Not to mention I would have noticed if I hit something that caused damage to the underside. This is likely the case of a technician not noticing the damage during a prior return and unless I would have physically got down on my knees and looked under the vehicle during my inspection of the vehicle when I received it (which I have never done and am not sure if this is an expectation of their customers), it would have never been known and is now my burden as a VERY loyal customer (almost 70 rental days this year). That may change depending on how this is handled. I will also be reporting this to the State of Florida under who's contract this is under.

Resolution: National accept responsibility for this damage, close out this rental at no cost to me and compensate me for the time delay and stress related to dealing with this issue.

Site would not allow photos. Will send to email address if provided.

Hello,
A few months ago I reserved a midsize / intermediate suv through a travel agency “fti touristik gmbh” for a 17-day rental.
Arriving at vancouver airport on june 15t, national car offered me a chevrolet trax, where you can see without opening the trunk that there is no space for luggage. I asked several times if this is really the car I reserved, as this is not the first time I rent such an suv. As our luggage didn’t fit into the trunk I asked for the next category. I got offered a fullsize suv “buick enclave” for 30 cad extra a day. After dealing like in a bazar I got the car for 25 cad. The employees told me several time that either I take the chevi trax I reserved or pay this 25 bucks extra a day. English is not my first language, but even for me it was clear that “intermediate” means something in between and not a car which is declared as small by the manufacturer. I was meanwhile more than an hour at the rental station and got tired to discuss and we don’t want to travel more than 2 weeks having bags on the knees. Therefore, there was not a real choice and we took the buick.
The car himself was ok, but not what I ordered and far too big to my needs.

During my vacation I opened an inquiry / complaint about my experience at vancouver airport [protected]). The answers I got via phone were like joke:
- national car is categorizing the cars by them themselves
- national car is never guarantee a specific car make / model
On the other hand, they could not tell me any make / model of a compact suv
Overall, national car decides which car I get and everything was correct.

A week ago when I returned the car, I now got the bill.in addition to the prepaid amount of 950 cad for the “intermediate suv”, the upgrade to a fullsize suv cost’s me additionally 672.49 cad! Not talking about the additional fuel needed.

Quite a lot of money, what leads me to investigate:

Fact is:
According to http://www.nationalcar.de/Fleet/631/de?selectedCountry=CA the chevi trax is a compact suv and not a midsize suv. So national didn’t tell me the truth.
The rental agreement [protected] reflect that as well:
Vehicle information:
Reserved: intermediate suv
Driven: compact suv
Charged: standard size suv

According to the web https://www.nationalcar.com/en_US/car-details/us/pgar-premium-crossover.html the buick enclave is in a higher category than a fullsize suv. This may explain that such an upgrade I so expensive? Even here i’m not sure about the rate.

Neither at vancouver airport nor during the call about my inquiry I got the feeling that i’m a customer. They don’t want to discuss; they just want to get rid of me as soon as possible.

Needless to say, that after such an experience I would never choose national / alamo / europcar. Nevertheless, I would like to have a statement from national cars about
- tell me just one make / modell of a compact suv?
- what is the next upper category to a midsize / intermediate suv?
- why are the for costs an upgrade from midsize to fullsite 30 cad (Afterwards 25cad / day)
- please send me this statement to walter. [protected]@gmx. Ch

Regards walter

A few months ago I reserved a midsize / intermediate suv through a travel agency for a 17-day rental.
Arriving at vancouver airport, national car offered me a chevrolet trax. Where you can see without opening the trunk that there is no space for luggage. I asked several times if this is really the car I reserved, as this is not the first time I rent such an suv. As our luggage didn’t fit into the trunk I asked for the next category. I got offered a fullsize suv “buick enclave” for 30 cad extra a day. After dealing like in a bazar I got the car for 25 cad. The employees told me several time that either I take the chevi trax I reserved or pay this 25 bucks extra a day. English is not my first language, but even for me it was clear that “intermediate” means something in between and not a car which is declared as small by the manufacturer. I was meanwhile more than an hour at the rental station and got tired to discuss and we don’t want to travel more than 2 weeks having bags on the knees. Therefore, there was not a real choice and we took the buick.
The car himself was ok, but not what I ordered and far too big to my needs.

During my vacation I opened an inquiry / complaint about my experience at vancouver airport. The answers I got via phone were like joke:
- national car is categorizing the cars by them themselves
- national car is never guarantee a specific car make / model
On the other hand, they could not tell me any make / model of a compact suv
Overall, national car decides which car I get and everything was correct.

A week ago when I returned the car, I now got the bill.in addition to the prepaid amount of 950 cad for the “intermediate suv”, the upgrade to a fullsize suv cost’s me additionally 672.49 cad! Not talking about the additional fuel needed.

Quite a lot of money, what leads me to investigate:

Fact is:
-according to http://www.nationalcar.de/Fleet/631/de?selectedCountry=CA the chevi trax is a compact suv and not a midsize suv. So national didn’t tell me the truth.
The rental agreement reflects that as well:
Vehicle information:
Reserved: intermediate suv
Driven: compact suv
Charged: standard size suv

According to the web https://www.nationalcar.com/en_US/car-details/us/pgar-premium-crossover.html the buick enclave is in a higher category than a fullsize suv. This may explain that such an upgrade I so expensive? Even here i’m not sure about the rate I really paid.

Neither at vancouver airport nor during the call about my inquiry I got the feeling that i’m a customer. They don’t want to discuss; they just want to get rid of me as soon as possible.

Needless to say, that after such an experience I would never choose national / alamo / europcar.

Flights were delayed causing late arrival to destination (El Paso International Airport, El Paso, TX). Contacted National Car 877 number and was given local (El Paso) telephone number. Called three different times leaving same information (contract no., name, call back number, and reason for call). Message on counter phone was that they were unable to answer the call at the moment but assuredly will call back. Never received a call back.
In the reason for call portion of the message, I explained that my flight would arrive at midnight, which is the time that the counter typically closes. I explained that I would be about 15-20 minutes delayed getting to the counter and would they wait for my arrival. (I arrived at the counter at 12:05 am and it was closed.) Again, never got a call back to any of my calls, not even the next day.
Immediately, I called the National 877 number and although the agent tried to assist, he was unable to do anything about my situation.
I have the sense that customer satisfaction is irrelevant with this National Car office.
Had to hire a taxi at a greater personal expense.
I'm a regular business travel using Emerald Club, but will switch to AVIS.

I rented a vehicle from the Terrace/Kitimat airport at National. It seems they want me to make a fraudulent claim of damage, which they state happened when I had their vehicle. When I picked up the car from the airport, the service representative told me that the car had damage and I noticed there was a fair bit of damage, so I made notes on the rental document I had, but unfortunately, I did not take photos. No one came out to inspect the car when I rented it and I was left on my own to find my way to the vehicle. The young lady at the rental kiosk made notes of the damages and said I would not be charged for any of the scratches and dents as well as a chip on the windshield. As I mentioned, no one actually came out to the vehicle to do any inspection, and foolishly, I did not take any photos myself because they had acknowledged all the damage. I had the vehicle for 6 days and drove a total of 112 miles during that entire period of time. For 3 of the 6 days the car was parked. There was no other damages to the vehicle when I brought it in.

In any event, here we are a week later, and I get an email from National with photos of all the damage they allege I caused. The photos that were sent to me did not show any new damage and while I did make notes on the rental form as to the damage, I realize those are my personal notes and they don’t mean anything other than I made a note… I can prove that I dropped the car off at 4:30 a.m. because I had a flight to catch, so from the moment those keys were dropped off in the drop box, I do not see how I could be responsible for the car until someone has time to inspect it. What a sham!

This was what the National representative stated:
"Obviously, no one can say for certain that it didn’t happen after you dropped it off, but if you choose to return the vehicle during non-business hours, then you are responsible for the vehicle until our staff has an opportunity to look at it. If we accepted that reasoning, then any person who damaged a vehicle would be able to drop it off in the middle of the night and tell us it wasn’t like that when they left it. If you are able to provide me photos of the vehicle upon your return that show the scrapes are not present then I will consider the claim closed."

I am concerned that they are trying to get a free paint job out of me and I am not prepared to put in a fraudulent accident claim to help them out. I believe this is a scam because they know that no one came outside and did a check of the vehicle at the time of rental. No charges have been placed against my credit card as of yet, but I will certainly take it to small claims if necessary since it is a totally false claim. I contacted my credit card company and they advised me that they cannot prevent the charge (if one comes through).

I would like to know how a car company can come back a full week later making claims they know to be false. How do I fight this? There are no 'before' and 'after' photos to prove their claim, and I cannot see how they can claim any responsibility for, first of all: damage that was already there; and secondly: sending me this information a week after the vehicle was returned.

You will also notice that the damage to the rear of the vehicle would more than likely have been caused by a minor collision. I would have known if I had hit something or if someone would have hit me. Again, the damages were already on the vehicle when it was picked up.

Hi

I went to National rental car in New Jersey, Jersey city and had a horrible experience this morning.

I had a confirmed reservation today to pick up a car at a 9 AM in the morning and got a call from rental company stating the cars would be available only between 9: 30 to 10 AM and they asked me to come around that time.

I picked up a cab to rental company and there were no cars available and no proper response available. I have lost wages for couple of hours and picked up a car from a different car company which is 7 Miles away.

Worst rental experience ever.

National Car Rental is a scam in Victoria, BC Canada Airport location. They will charge you for damages AFTER you've self parked your vehicle in their lot with NO ONE to review and witness any damages to the vehicle. It is up to you to self park the car in their lot, bring the keys to their booth, and have them give your the receipt of the RENTAL charges on your card. Then after you leave, they will claim you have damage on the car and you will get billed for more than what you paid for your rental. This happened to me June 2015. I spoke to their fleet manager and stated that no one from National checked the car upon my immediate return so they cannot prove with 100% certainty that the damage occurred while in my possession. He ignored it and said the charges will stay.

I am currently stopping the charges through my credit card company. I hope they don't get a penny. They do not care about repeat business and I even told them I would launch a stop payment on this over a matter of $125. This place is a scam. Buyer beware!

I booked a car using rentalcars.com, including collision damage insurance. At the rental counter I disputed the contract showing additional charge for insurance. I was told that is how it shows on their contracts and should I have a problem with it I could present my rentalcars.com agreement when I returned the car. This turned out to be a lie and I was charged THREE times the original rental cost for insurance I did not need or want.

Ok, I damaged one of national's cars. I did this exactly once. I paid the damages in full, no questions asked.

I was intoxicated, I admitted it. I paid for that too.

The state in which the offense occurred has forgiven me. I served my time and paid their fines. I fully complied with their terms.

My home state learned of the offense and punished me also. I satisfied their conditions. They have forgiven me.

I have made a few mistakes and I admit to them. God has forgiven me.

National rental car has an unforgiving policy. Dnr is for life, no 2nd chances, no questions, I will never be forgiven.

It's not really about safety, it's about risk management.

I'm a risk, no matter how many years pass, I will always be a risk.

No one was hurt in my offense, thankfully, but my name and character are tarnished forever.

I'm square with the world, but not national rental car. I forgive them.

Jtc

This has been nothing short of the worst customer service I have ever had to deal with. National Car Rental has been my choice of rental car companies for years. However this location should be shut down. This review is not from one experience but 5 over the last 6 months. I am a business professional not a teenager however I was treated like by not taken the Insurance Upgrade or the Upgrade to the next car level that I had three eyes. In addition to just an overwhelming bad attitude my first rental came with a GPS and a EZPass neither of which I asked for or signed off on. Once I realized they were both in the vehicle I immediately called the Branch and was told by Andrew Pascarelli that I would have to pay what ever the charges were since I drove away with them. Well I didn't pay for any of the charges but only because I had to contact the National 800 line to take care of this. That was trip one and it only gets worse. Let me take a step back and say that none of the 5 rentals was I asscorted to the vehicle and shown different choices. With each of my rentals Andrew pointed to which ever car was in front of the office and I was told there you go. Unlike my rentals from other National Locations each of these were dirty and obviously had not been cleaned in between customers. Because I am not one to complain and quite frankly I have so many other important things going on I simply let that aspect of this experience go. You know pick your battles. This last experience however I can not let go when I received an email from Andrew Pascarelli stating he was completing STOLEN CAR RENTAL paperwork and I would be stopped, pulled from the vehicle and arrested. Here's the kicker the car was already returned the day before. I could go on and on and on however I will simple say stay away until their staff has been upgraded or rent at your own risk. This is one battle I am willing to step into as this has been the worst experience I have ever had. I will state this is specifically directed to this location however if the company allows this to continue I can only assume they are to blame as well.

I rented a car from National Car Rental for two days out of DFW with National. The agents told me at the counter that cars had normal wear and tear. The car we rented had minor scratches, street tar and had not recently be cleaned. When we returned the car, the agent receiving the vehicle pointed out a scratch on the bumper and asked what happened. We said nothing while we had the car, that it must have been pre-existing damage. The agent then wrote up a small yellow slip to have it 'evaluated' and asked us to sign. I changed the verbiage on the form because the write up did not reflect what we said or what we saw. A month later, I get a bill in the mail with different damage photographed and highlighted for nearly $1000. The vehicle was drivable and did not require repair, yet we were billed for a new fender, property value loss, loss of rental days and other unrelated charges.

I informed my insurance company to contact them to substantiate the claim and pay if it was in fact valid. However, the company claiming to represent National Car Rental has disregarded my agents attempts and continued to send threatening messages to me via email. I would send a certified letter with notarization, but National Car Rental Damage Recovery Unit conveniently uses a PO box rather than a street address for official mail. The 'Damage Recovery Unit' claiming to represent the car rental company has done nothing to provide proof to validate the claim and has not honored requests to contact my appointed agent. Everything I have done has been ignored.

I just had costly, bad experiences on 2 rentals with National Car rental booked through CarRentals.com for rentals in Nice, France. I was charged nearly double what was quoted in my contracts on both rentals. Neither agency has refunded the overcharges or offered to do so although National has admitted their error. It's a "bait and switch" scam. CarRentals.com quotes extremely low prices, but the rental agency doesn't honor the contract after the car is returned. Don't rent through them!

I am an Emerald Club member. I rented a car one-way from Las Vegas to Phoenix for a family vacation. Rental agreement said $5 per day for 4 days at $260 for a total. I have an email to confirm this. Upon returning home I find that the new total is $469 because they charged me for every mile driven at $.25 per mile. This was not indicated on the agreement but the new bill labeled this as "excessive miles" and charged for EVERY mile driven. This is a classic case of bait and switch. The National manager gave me a $50 rebate after an hour on the phone. I work for a very large international company (300k employees) and National is the preferred vendor. I have to believe that National will be dissappointed to lose such a large customer.

I reserved a mid-sized suv online with national car rental. The cost estimate was $600. When I arrived at the airport I asked a staff member which suv I should take. They asked if I reserved an suv and I said yes. They said "do you want to take this car?" it was a gmc acadia parked outside the rental doors - it was not in a specific rental area. I said sure. There was no contract in the vehicle. When I dropped the vehicle off at the airport I was running late and did not have the chance to look at the invoice. Later that day when I got back hope I checked the invoice and saw I was billed $1, 300! I called their 800# and was advised that my billing issue would be escalated and i'd hear back from them in 3 business days. 4 days later I did not hear back from them so I called back. They advised that they closed the case and refunded me $100. I asked why no one contacted me, and they did not know why. I advised that this was not nearly the amount of the difference and they said it was the best they could do, and to contact the office (Newark liberty airport) where I rented the vehicle. I said this was pretty poor customer service and they then immediate transferred me to the local office. After explaining the situation to the local office, they said I would need to speak with the counter person I met with when I rented, but that he wasn't in until later that day and he would call me back. 5 days have gone by and no one has called back. I called the local office back today and was first transferred and then hung up on. Got to be the worst customer service ever! Total bait and switch - this should be illegal.

I travelled to Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas, Mexico. When I first rented the car, they filled a paper with marks where previous bumps and scratches were before I took it off. When I returned from my trip, they wanted me to pay a new scratch that according to them was not in the paper. We show them it was marked in the paper they filled in the beginning. They brought up the manager and first he told us it was not there...when he could not deny the obvious he told us it was there, but now we made it bigger (so..I managed to hit the car again exactly in the previous scratch!).
We were loosing our vacation time, so we had to pay the scratch and left.

Awful international customer service

I first placed my complaint to Mexico's customer service office. I had not received an answer for a month so I tried international customer service. I sent all the papers that proved the scratch was there previously. They answered again almost a month and a half later (and because I asked them again if they had news) when they told me I would receive answers in 8 days. Their answer was everything looked all right...and guess what? They sent me again the original paper where you can see clearly the scratch was marked before I took the car. They just don't even read what they are sending.

I recently hired a van from the National/Europcar Nottingham branch. I hired it over the weekend, and when I returned it on the Sunday the car park was closed. As requested by them, I parked it on the street outside, and put the keys in a key-drop.

A week later they sent me an invoice for the rental. I was astonished to find that they had charged me for damages! They did not tell me what these damages were. I went to their office as soon as I could, and the man there told me that all their paperwork was sent immediately to head office, so he could not supply me with a copy. He could, however, tell me that the damage was a slash in the tyre. How could I possibly have driven the van on the motorway with a slashed tyre? The damage was obviously inflicted after I had dropped it off, and it was parked on the road outside their office.

I sent a number of emails, but have so far received no reply. The first one was sent a week ago. I also phoned customer services up on Thursday, but they could tell me nothing more than the man in the office, apart from the fact that it was one of the front tyres which was slashed. He could not send me a copy of the damage report because it had gone to their insurers. They have already charged me for the damage, so why are they involving their insurers? Could it be that they are claiming for this so-called damage, which I haven't even seen? Customer Services also claimed that they had 6 hours to check in the van after I had dropped it off. I can't find this in their terms and conditions, but even if it is true, I dropped the van off at 1pm on Sunday, when I agreed to. This still leaves 13 hours or so whilst the van was outside the car park, and according to them, in their care. Can I really be made liable for damage which was not inflicted by me?

It was August 21/10 on a friday morning I booked a rental car from Nationa Car Rental in Cobourg Ontario. Around 1 p.m. I picked the car up which was a Chrysler Sebring and to my knowledge looked to be in great shape. The drive to Montreal was great until we were 10 km south west of Montreal when I noticed the front brakes starting to act up. At that point I proceeded to check into my hotel room, once I entered my hotel room I promptly opened the service agreemtent envelope which was given to me by the rental company, I then called the roadside assistance number as any normal consumer would do. Roadside advised me to take it to the National Car Rental just down the street and exchange it for another car which I did. When I was there they gave me a lower grade car than I had at the time I asked them should I call the National Car Rental in Cobourg where I rented the vechicle from and the Montreal National Car Rental advised me to just take their car and drive it as I need and to return it to Cobourg and that the Montreal Rental would take care of contacting Cobourg from there. The rest of the weekend was great we returned on Sunday August 23, 2010 to Cobourg and returned the back up car which we were give in Montreal around 5 p.m. I took my own car which was a done up Ford Mustang which stuck out like a sore thumb and drove home. I know me specaking about my own personal vechicle seems to have no meaning but please read on and you will understand. Approx. Three weeks later was when I realized how screwed I got by National Car Rental when I received my credit card statement. A $200.00 car rental turned into just over $1, 300.00 car rental. I called the Cobourg dealership who I got into on the phone with and they told me that I was being charged for two weeks rental as well as the recovery of their own car in Dorval Quebec. Cobourg told me he had not received any notification from the Montreal dealer and that he just so happened to open up an email from them exactly two week after I returned the car to Cobourg, seems funny how I was charged for those two weeks. He said I should have never called Roadside assist that I should have called him directly to tell him about the brake problem and I told him that any customer would call the Roadside Assist telephone number which was in the envelope which they gave me at the time of renting the car. At that point I found out that Cobourg was independently owned National Car Rental Company. They told me they had tried to call the phone number which I gave them but they had taken down the incorrect phone number and they thought their car had been stolen, even though my Mustang was gone and there was a car from National Leasing Company in Montreal sitting in their parking lot. My question is if they thought the vechical was stolen would they not have called they police as they had my name, address and drivers license number? To say the least they kept hanging up on us time and time again so we do not bother calling Cobourg anymore.

The next step in the process was to call National Car Rental customer care, they told me they would reimbursed me the fees I was charged to recover the vechical in 21 business days, which was just over $700.00. So great atleast I was suppose to get some money back from all of this. Once I had a chance to think about what I had gone through and what I deserve in return, $700.00 was not enough as the Cobourg vechical could have cost me my life as well as others on the road that day and not to mention the phone calls I have had to deal with. My next call to customer care was to be reimbursed for the actual 3 days I had the car, and not a cent more, their respond was that "Sir someone higher up will give you a call at this time". A week later no phone call from anyone, so the third phone call was made to customer care at this point they connected me with a manager who must say was very pleasant and helpful her response was we are not sure what happened to the cheque and we will look into it for you. A couple of days later surprisingly she called and left a message saying that she was able to process the $700.00 cheque and would send me two one day rental coupons. I did receive the rental coupons she promised but no cheque. I then made the fourth phone call, a point you need to understand everytime I called customer care they no history or data of my rental whatsoever, therefore I had to explain the whole story time and time again. At this point the customer care person spoke with a manager and they said this has gone on for too long and that they would look into it and see why this cheque has never been sent. The answer I received was that the cheque was never approved and sent off as I had been told many times before. They then had an agency contact me in regards to the situation and the persons name was Christopher Sanderson who advised me that the reason why there was never any money sent was because of an on going dispute between the Cobourg dealer and the Montreal dealer as to who was going to pay me. I faxed off the rental agreement and credit card slips to Christopher Sanderson as he had requested and to date have not had a phone call from him and I have also placed a couple of phone calls to Christopher Sanderson and to date i have had no response.

Do you know that National Car Rental doesn't let you rent a car from them using your debit card if you don't have a round-trip ticket?

It's their "company policy" not to rent out cars at airports to people without round-trip tickets and willing to pay by their debit card.

I spend two hours there talking to the local manager, to everyone at their 800 number trying to pick up a car I reserved earlier online.

No one even could explain the reasoning behind this policy. They just said "it's for security reasons".

I just wish I didn't spent all that time there. I called Avis from their phone because I started to run out of minutes on my cell phone, booked a car and was driving 15 minutes later. Paid with my debit card, didn't have to show them any tickets.

Incident
National Car Rental Commits Negligence by Not Having Snow Tires on any of its cars for renters going skiing in the mountains. And I understand NO car rental companies at Denver Airport have cars with snow tires, studded or not. Through Priceline I rented a Chevy HHR at Denver Airport that apparently with 25, 000 miles had very little tread on its tires. None of the cars in the row I chose from had sufficient tread on so-called all-weather tires. National says front-wheel drive cars are all that's needed to drive in the heavy Colorado snow at 10, 000 feet. Wrong. I pulled into the Dillon Post Office a few weeks ago and slid sideways going at 2 mph into a car. The right bumper was damaged on my car and there was damage to the car hit: sidewall of a Subaru came off. The car proved incapable of climbing the driveway from my condo without a running, sliding start. I would drive slowly in this car especially on turns since it had NO traction. Now National wants to charge me $1, 100 for the damage to the car and they still insist that bald tires on a front-wheel drive car are sufficient to avoid any claims of negligence on their part. This is SNOW COUNTRY. Such negligence will ultimately cause deaths. All car rental agencies at Denver Airport should offer renters snow tires, studded or not as part of the deal. Snow tires are not on their list of "accessories." Most of the locals here know that even a 4x4 is not good enough and that snow tires with good tread are needed. How do we get car rental agencies to ensure that their renters do not die in one of their death traps?

Damage Resulting
Economic damage claimed by National $1, 110. Economic damage claimed by car hit: $1, 450. All due to a slide into a parking spot going 2 mph.

Car rental reservation with National Car Rental was made in the USA.

In Frankfurt, I picked up the car on 6/13/07 and returned it on 6/19/07.

I did not know, that I was actually covered by my Visa card (rental was charged to Visa) for any damage to the rental car. The rental agent in Germany did not make mention of this either. Instead, he sold me collision damage and extra coverage for the vehicle with a 500.00 Euro deductible. I wanted a smaller deductible and was willing to pay the additional charges, but was told, no smaller deductible was available.

When I returned the car, the rental agent pointed out and remarked in writing on the return document (I have a copy) “small scratch front windscreen” and “small scratch NSF wheel trim”. I did not see it when I checked out the car and accepted responsibility for the very minimal damage.

On 8/11/07 my credit card was charged with $797.89 (plus foreign exchange fee) by Vanguard AV Gmbh & Co. KG, Damage Recovery, Otto-von-Guericke Ring 15, Wiesbaden, Germany. Upon contacting this company I was faxed an invoice, which actually is an estimate, not a repair invoice, for the replacement of the windscreen (Opel Corsica was the car make & model) and the hub cap (only 23.65 Euro for the hub cap, rest f. the windscreen replacement).

I also was told, the car could not legally be operated without replacing the windshield in Germany due to the “small scratch”.

This is not true, because I personally called the TUV in Wiesbaden (Government Agency responsible for the technical vehicle disposition “out of service”). I was told by a TUV representative ”we do not put vehicles out of service, because of a small scratch on the windshield”.

I sent an e-mail to this company, that I was willing to pay an appropriate amount for the damage, but not 633.00 Euro for the replacement of a windscreen on an Opel Corsica, especially not, because I have only an estimate for the repairs not an actual repair invoice from a reputable repair shop.

I do not know, if they even replaced the windscreen, and/or how many other customers were charged for the same thing.

9-8-09 I placed this complaint 1-wk ago but have yet to get email or phone call from anyone concerning this new policy of renting using only credit cards. As in my earlier complaint i'am a good emerald card holding customer w/o any charges owed. Even after being a member since 1997 using the same suntrust debit card I was refused a rental. The agent further explained that I could hold the car on a credit card but pay upon return of the car with my atm card that again i've used since being a member. I'am a police officer and I cannot jepordize my employment in any way. I know i'am not special but some consideration should be in place in the system to assit long time emerald card customers, especially those who've no out-standing balance (S) and currently are in good standing w/national. Help mr. Day