Car-Hire-UK.com

I arranged a rental from Car-Hire-UK in July 2016 for pick up at London Gatwick in August. The next thing I saw was £600 had been taken from my card. I was told this was a refundable deposit to cover the insurance excess. I was told "all car rental companies do this" which of course they don't. I was also told " don't worry, the deposit will be returned 21 working days after the return of the vehicle. The rental and renturn of the car went without a problem and the rates were very reasonable, perhaps because they apparently had no intention of returning my deposit. One year later they still have my £600. My credit card company has reimbursed me but it really distresses me that Car-Hire-UK can get away with this. I continue my attempts to contact them by phone to no avail. Do not be tempted by this company's low rates.

My experience re the none return of deposit is exactly the same as everybody else, they are still doing it ... in my case over $800 ... the number of times this has been perpetrated and the similarity of the cases I believe proves what is known as 'system' and is a criminal rather than civil dispute, simply because the antecedence somewhat substantiate the assertion that these deposit refusals are rehearsed and so must be a planned and prepared scheme devised simply to illegally retain an undue enrichment by deception. I think the UK police must now examine these allegations rather than trading standards etc.

We booked Car-Hire-UK online from Australia for a 30 day road trip around UK & Ireland, we paid extra to go to Ireland. First problem was we booked a specific car (RAV 4) turns out they don't have them in their fleet, not a good start but we stayed with them as we'd already paid in full, big mistake. Secondly we booked an automatic, got a manual - no compensation back to us of course. We had to pay a deposit that they say they would refund in 21 days, took a lot of emails, complaining and threats but we finally got it back, read other reviews of Car-Hire-Uk, they didn't get their deposits back, beware. The car was old (6 years old). The car developed a problem retaining water and the radiator reservoir had to be watched and refilled. When the problem first happened we rang them, this was on a Thursday (via Australia at our cost) and eventually was told that they were to busy with other problems and would get back to us. Didn't even give us the option to take it somewhere to get looked at. They never did get back to us. On the Sunday the car finally stopped. We could not raise Car-Hire-UK until the next Wednesday, really, what about their 24/7 assist, on-existent. While we're on the side of the M6 we used the highway phone and spoke to Scottish Transport who themselves couldn't even raise CarHireUK? Scotland Police had to tow us off the M6, even a photo of this emailed to CarhireUK them on the Sunday did not raise a reply?? We had to hire an alternative car from Enterprise to continue the trip after losing a day of our holiday. By the way Enterprise refunded our deposit before we landed back in Australia so why does Car-Hire-UK even need the stated 21 days? Over the last week of our holiday we tried to resolve the problem with Car Hire UK and recover our loss, not a chance, they are not a company that is easy to deal with after you have booked and paid or take responsibility for their lack of services or their stock (i.e. the car) that was not suitable for the hire. It spoilt what was an awesome trip. Scottish Transport and the Scottish Police where brilliant, Car Hire UK let us down miserably and did not at any stage step up to the mark to help. Don't ruin your holiday, use someone else, Enterprise Car Rental were great with our last minute one way hire.

Firstly we requested a specific type of vehicle to which we were told would be requested & they would do their best to provide it only to learn later on they don't even have the vehicle we wanted in their fleet. We were told their vehicles were turned over every 6 months (indicating they have a near new fleet of vehicles on offer) - our vehicle was over 6 years old with over 60,000 miles on the clock.

After paying for the vehicle I requested a Contract/Agreement. I was promised it would be emailed to me within 4 days - never received it. Was told by the person who delivered the car to our hotel we would receive a Contract in the next few days - never received & to this date (5 months later) still haven' seen it. They advertise their cars come with a full tank of fuel - ours came with 1/4 tank and the car was not clean, plus it had a manual transmission where as their confirmation (not the agreement) stated Automatic - luckily I can drive a manual! Their website states they offer 24/7 assistance - this is a misrepresentation The car we hired from them conked out & died and when we rang 24/7 number - there was no-one answering. Scotland Transport couldn't raise them either authorities so the Police had to tow us to a Service Centre in the middle of nowhere in Scotland (if we had a Contract perhaps we could have called a service provider but to be honest, I don't think they have one!). I will add at this point we had reported a problem with the vehicle retaining water in the radiator 4 days earlier and asked where we could take the vehicle to be checked etc to which they replied "our Supervisor is busy with another problem this afternoon & will deal with this tomorrow". They were to call the next day to advise us further and we never heard from them. We continued with our travels, looking after the vehicle with water and kept the radiator full but it conked out as mentioned above. We left messages on their unattended 24/7 phone line and emailed them a photo being towed but they still didn't call us until days later - in the meantime, we had to get a taxi to Edinburgh (which cost £70) and hire another car - all at our expense. Eventually Car Hire UK contacted us and promptly told us they will not pay for any of our expenses but they would give us our deposit back (took 30 days). We have since requested reimbursement for the expenses incurred since their car failed but they will not entertain that request and blame us for their faulty car!! So please heed my warning and DO NOT HIRE A CAR FROM THEM. I am happy to discuss this with anyone who would like further information on this incident.

This company will take a big amount of money from your account 30 days before you get the car, as a warranty(?). But the problem is that you will never get it back!!!!! Or, if you are lucky, you will get back some of it after months of complaints.

I was very unimpressed with your service! My confirmation e-mail arrived 1 hour AFTER I had landed at Gatwick airport. I discovered you have no desk at the airport. When I was very kindly helped by a lady from another car company I waited over 1 hour for the car to arrive. I then had to pay £3.00 to get out of the car park.

AFTER I had returned the car I discovered you had taken a £500.00 deposit and £70.00 full tank off my deposit card at the time of booking and refuse to return it until 21 days AFTER you have received the car back. This is not advertised on your web site. If other car companies can immediately refund a deposit on the return of the car why can yours not? Because there is no desk at the airport the car has to be left unlocked with the the parking ticket in the car AND THE CUSTOMER IS STILL RESPONSIBLE FOR THE CAR until it has been collected by the hire company - this it TOTALLY UNACEPTABLE!!!! It is also very expensive to use a pay 'phone in Gatwick airport to 'phone the car hire company to tell them where the car has been left - this is ALL additional cost and hassle for the customer.

Most of the hyper-links on your web site do not work. I will NEVER use your company again and will NOT recommend you to my friends. I am a very unhappy customer.

PS I have just read on this review site about a customer who had hassle getting his deposit back - GIVE ME STRENGTH! SO using this company has not actually made it a cheaper option than using a well known company where the hassle factor would have been NIL and a deposit would have been returned promptly!

This was the second time we had hired a mini bus from Car-Hire-UK. This time we also opted for the Meet and Greet, Sat Nav and a baby seat. The man with te keys met as as agreed and everything was in place, car seta installed etc. The bus was not new, in fact we suspect it was the same vehicle we had had two years earlier. However it all worked and the reason we chose Car-Hire-UK was their price was much the best, not that their fleet was the newest. The mini-bus was perfect for our needs. The drop off was painless, we just parked the bus at Heathrow and walked.

Unfortunately the refund did not appear on our credit card when expected. I tried phoning and emailing in a somewhat ad hoc manner and got nowhere. So i read the Terms and Conditions which include a complaints procedure. I followed this procedure. I sent another email politely and calmly explaining the situation. I got no response to this email. So i went to the next step in the procedure which is to send an email marked For the attention of Maurice Goodwin. The next day Mr Goodwin phoned and explined that they had lost my credit card details and had been trying to contact me, they had not received my emails. He took my details again and about a week later the money was in my account.

So at the end of the day i felt that Car-Hire-UK were good value for money and the service was good, there was a glitch with the refund of my deposit but once I followed their complaints procedure this was resolved.

After many months of false promises, I phoned Trading Standards.

I logged the complaint and asked them to make sure they gave me feedback on how they were doing.

Then I phoned up Car-Hire UK and told them that Trading Standards was looking into this and were considering it a CRIMINAL OFFENSE. i.e. SERIOUS.

I also told Car-Hire UK that I was sending them a letter to start my own legal proceedings (Trading Standards told me how to do this).

Car-Hire UK kept "fobbing me off" big style, at one point they even put me through to the AA and then to a fax machine! I told the guy who answered initially very clearly what I had done and that he should put me through to XXX or YYY and that I wasn't going away! So he did. I told XXX and YYY that both CRIMINAL and CIVIL legal action was being taken against them.

THEY PAID UP ON THE SPOT THEN!!!

Also, don't just take their word for it. I asked XXX to scan and email me my refund receipt.

I was phoning from Korea, so what worked for me was finding a cheap international calling card that lasted for 2 hours. It was an exhausting week getting my money back (600 pounds) as I had to phone them twice for extended periods, but worth it.

NEVER USE THESE PEOPLE. Car-Hire UK. Report them to Trading Standards if they are dodging paying back your deposit. You can get it back. They don't want to go to jail! The number for trading standards is here in this thread, some body else posted it.

I honestly can't say how bad these people are….if you only read this line, do yourself a favour and rent with someone else.

As with other reviewers, they were happy to take 570 GBP at the moment I confirmed the rental - how you can justify taking a rental deposit 3 months before you have the keys to the car should have alerted me to the tricks these folks will pull on you.

The car itself had over 37,000 miles on it and was "well used" but I will give credit to the guy who meets you at the airport to hand over the key. He was decent. Little did I know that chatting with him would be the highlight of my rental.

I've rented with every major and many minor car rental companies all over the World (I travel a lot with work) and I've never, ever had such a woeful experience in getting my deposits back. I returned the car - with no damage, full fuel…as expected. It took me 4 months of phone calls, emails and finally being one step away from legal action to get my money returned. Never was there any intent or effort on behalf of them to voluntarily return my deposits.

I can only think that in holding people's deposit for 6 or more months, they're able to use the deposits to create positive cash-flow within the company, hold the cash on deposit and earn interest from your money while you pay interest to your credit card company. That these clowns have been featured on BBC Radio, national press like The Guardian etc should tell you that their work practises are at best borderline legal. Trading Standards in the UK have also investigated them and found them to be less that squeaky clean.

I'm also very dubious about the positive reviews posted here. They all seem to portray a company that comes to the rescue of people in distress. I just don't find them credible - it doesn't fit with all the evidence that strongly suggests that this is one company that should be prosecuted, closed down and the owners barred from owning another company again.

In conclusion: rent elsewhere. I know I wish I had.

like us all now days did a quick review and though this must be the worst company in world but then reviewed Avis and then hertz scam and found these big names to have ten times worst reviews, and have to be honest its a shame we dont put the whole picture and see who else people are writing these reviews about, i let them know about reviews and they said it seems every company has someone writing outrageous comments about them I just wish people were more truthful so that a review actually helped, as these reviews caused me a little distress on what i had booked and i neednt have worried as the service was brillant, the car good and the price £1000 cheaper than hertz for 30 days, so really happy with deal. I paid for the excess insurance cover, so no problems on return, which seems to be the common complaint here about people not paying for damage it seems