I felt the brand stood for courtesy and reassurance. Unfortunately, a recent experience in Italy suggests some of their staff do not understand how easy it is to damage a long-established brand.
On Monday 29 September we took out a Fiat 500 from your Firefly division at the Hertz desk in Lamezia airport. The staff member was a bit surly but otherwise efficient. The car was fine. Unfortunately there occurred an incident which any car renter dreads. On October 2nd our car was damaged and we took it back to Lamezia airport to replace it. Dealing with Hertz reassured us we were not dealing with any Mickey Mouse company. We expected sympathy and a swift settlement. Instead despite the police report, we were treated as if we had caused the problem (fire-damage possibly caused deliberately whilst we were parked outside a restaurant eating inside).
Our experience was not only traumatic but was made unnecessarily unpleasant. Not only did we have to pay the full €1500 excess, but we lost the use of our car for our holiday. Initially, the member of staff refused to replace the car at all. Only after making a fuss did he relent and say we could take a car. However, this offer was virtually meaningless as we would be liable for all damage i.e. no insurance was offered at all. Neither would he let us take the damaged car back. His attitude was totally unsympathetic to our traumatic experience in a foreign land. He was surly and became positively rude and aggressive when we refused to allow him to keep the original police report (There was no problem with him keeping the copy he had taken). Given his stance, we obtained a car from a company that wanted our business.
Worryingly, if the incident had happened outside a town we could have been left stranded in a foreign country through no fault of our own. We had not fire-damaged our car as the police report and numerous witnesses could testify. In potentially stressful situations you expect brands to live up to their promise to minimise these type of problems. That is why you purchase their product. I thought we could rely on Hertz to provide a service of a certain standard, not to give the impression they could not care less. I am sure you will agree that this type of behaviour is not acceptable to a company with your reputation and would want to ensure that other customers do not have to go through our experience.
I look forward to hearing from you. read more