Despite warnings from the authorities and press releases from the Association of Consumer Rights Malta ACR, abuses by car hire companies are still going on.
ACR stated that there is still the malpractice from a number of online car hire companies to make unfair profit from their service through many hidden charges: the cost charged for fuel, the non-payment for returned unused fuel, high insurance excesses apart from not being given the actual car chosen.
Representatives of Association for Consumer Rights (ACR) saw a particular contract for a local car which was booked through a website.
This website offered a choice of car hire companies. The car ordered was from a local operator and the car was to be a small convertible or similar. The actual car given had a hard roof that was partly retractable and it was not a convertible. Only two of this type was available as the rest were partly retractable. Website quoted the amount of €271.23 for four days including insurance cover but with €1300 excess.
Looking further at the website advert, additional insurance was encouraged to be purchased to remove this high excess. This Damage Refund Insurance was at an additional cost of €57.20 i.e. another €14.30 a day. Even so, the latter insurance comes with fixed damage cost limits for certain parts of the car. You need to be an insurance expert to understand all this jargon. This apart from an additional €13.75 to be paid before pick up if you wish to find the car at the airport and drop it off there. At the airport counter, the customer had €800 blocked on his credit card by the local operator. There was also a compulsory purchase of a full tank of petrol with the price of petrol only known at the counter when picking up the car. Price was €66.5 whether you use it or not as there is no refund for unused petrol. This is the current price for 50.76 litres of unleaded fuel. The tank's capacity was only 35 litres.
Yet the local operator representing the company at the counter would have offered the choice of returning the petrol tank full without paying any money had the customer hired a car directly from them. This option was not offered at the local operator desk as the clerk said that the car was hired via an online broker even though the local operator was selected by the customer.
As one can see, there are many costs and hidden information when hiring a car but the overall price is never quoted.
The Association for Consumers Rights calls once again on the competent authorities, including the MCCAA and the Malta Transport Authority to ensure that these abusive practices are immediately investigated and discontinued
Pauline Azzopardi
ACT Executive Committee member and European Consumer Consultative Group
On behalf of Association for Consumer Rights, Malta (ACR)