Tuesday 5 January 2010

Oman: car rental woes – an update

Several weeks ago, our chums rented a 4WD heap of junk which broke down near the Wahiba desert. Numerous phone calls and a farcical series of events later, Hertz eventually provided a replacement heap of junk the following day, delivered by a character known as Mr. Syrup. Click here for the full story.

When we returned the car to the airport, Mr. Syrup said he would ‘talk to his manager’ about reducing the charges. A few days later, Neil received an email agreeing to reduce the charges by one day. However, the final bill included mileage for the replacement car from Muscat to the Wahiba. In addition, the total mileage was re-calculated over four days instead of five, with a large chunk now being charged as excess mileage. The final bill was therefore far greater than renting over the original period, meaning they were making additional money from the breakdown of their crappy car.

Mr. Syrup failed to respond to a further email politely pointing out the lack of logic in his calculations, backed up with all sorts of facts and figures. Neil was forced to pull out the big guns and wrote to Hertz Head Office in the UK who have just responded with an apology and a FULL refund. That’s what is known as ‘customer service’. Well done Hertz.

I shall keep an eye out for Mr. Syrup wearing orange overalls on the hard shoulder of the Sultan Qaboos highway.

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