"Please do not worry first. We can check every charge together." This line stayed in my mind the most. I had already gone through my credit card bill many times after I went back home and I still felt something was wrong with the fuel and the border fee. I booked the car on QEEQ and used it in Charleroi in Belgium. It started when I saw the final bill. I stared at the charges on my phone and kept thinking that the total looked higher than I expected. It was almost ninety something euros. The fuel part confused me the most. I was sure I filled up the tank before I returned the car. I stood in the cold wind at the gas station and took several photos of the fuel gauge because I was afraid of this exact situation. Then I saw a fuel charge on the bill and also a border fee and my mind just froze a bit. I felt pretty annoyed at the beginning. It felt like I was charged extra but I did not really understand all the papers from the rental counter. When I contacted customer service my speaking speed was fast and in my head I thought it would be some copy paste reply. The person who answered surprised me. They listened to my whole story and did not cut me off. They only stopped me to confirm some facts. After some messages I noticed that the same person was always following my case. They asked me if I had any new screenshots from my bank and they repeated the amounts they found on their side in a simple way so even someone like me who is not great at numbers could follow. They said the rental company showed a total charge of a bit more than ninety euros and they broke it down into the basic amount the border fee and the fuel charge. Then they asked me to check if my card had only one charge or two. If there was a second smaller one then it could be a double charge for the border part and they would go on with that. In my head I felt it was like someone checking the bill with me so the pressure on me was smaller. The fuel issue was the part I could not let go. I remember very clearly driving to a station not far from the highway before I returned the car. I filled the tank until the pump stopped and the gauge went up to the top. I took photos of the gauge when I picked up the car and when I brought it back. When I sent these photos to the customer service they did not just say it was my fault. They said they would ask the rental company how they judged the fuel level. During those days I kept thinking about this again and again on the metro or in my room. I kept asking myself if I would just lose that money. Every time I had a new question like when I checked the contract and saw a border fee printed there I would ask again if that meant I paid it twice. They explained again in simple words that the number on the paper was only a display and the real payment was what showed on the card. They did not make me feel stupid. I could feel that they were trying to stand with me and not only speak for the rental desk. One moment I remember is when they told me they had already checked with the rental company and the local staff said the fuel was not full and they went to add more fuel and they even said they had a receipt. My first thought was why they did not show that proof to me. I told this to the customer service and they passed this question back and asked for more proof. Later the rental company only gave an inspection sheet with my signature on it and it showed a fuel level as six out of eight or something like that. The numbers confused me and I only remembered that I had signed it in a rush when I was trying to catch my next plan. During the whole process I felt that no matter if the reply from the rental company was good or bad for me the customer service would first tell me the result in a calm tone and then explain step by step. Sometimes they also said honestly that some internal papers could not be shared with me and they had to explain with what they were allowed to see. I still felt a bit upset inside but I could understand how things worked. For someone like me a young person renting a car alone in Europe and trying to read many English documents this kind of problem is very stressful. Those days I often had class or work during the day and at night when I came back to my place I would open my phone and see that they had sent me a new update. Even when it was not the result I hoped for I still felt a bit safer because I knew someone was still following my case and I was not alone staring at a bill with strange numbers. Now when I look back I feel the hardest part of this rental was not driving the car. It was the confusion about the charges after I returned it. If I did not have this one to one follow up from customer service I think I would have given up the complaint much earlier and just swallowed the cost. Because they stayed with me through the whole thing I dared to ask every question and learned to check the documents and the fuel gauge more carefully next time and to take clear photos as proof. For me this experience was not perfect and I still have some regret about the fuel part but having someone stay on my side and walk through all these fee items with me made a big difference. As an ordinary student I was still able to understand what really happened and that part mattered a lot to me.
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