A DRIVER was left outraged when they were charged £2,600 for repairs to their hire car after it broke down having covered just five miles.
The motorist, named only as SM, had to drive another 30 miles in the faulty vehicle only to be met with a hefty bill.
GettyA family were charged £2,600 after their rental car broke down having covered just five miles[/caption]
Writing an anonymous letter to the Guardian, SM explained that they had hired the VW Golf from rental company Green Motion at their central London branch.
The plan was to drive them, their partner and their two young children from London to Newcastle, but they had barely got out of the city centre when the engine warning light flickered into life.
However, they claim that Green Motion refused to replace the car and instead demanded that they drive another 30 miles with what was later found to be a faulty clutch to meet an AA patrol car.
Once the mechanic had diagnosed the problem, they had to follow the AA van to Letchworth, Hertfordshire, to be checked out by a VW dealership.
But, the woe did not end there as SM explained: “The garage could not repair the car there and then, and said it was not fit to be driven on to Newcastle.
“Green Motion would not provide us with a replacement, and we were forced to abandon the trip.
“We had to make our own way back to London and lost £360 we had paid for accommodation.
“Rather than refund us the £260 the car rental had cost, and apologise for providing us with a damaged car, Green Motion has blamed me for the failure of the clutch and applied a charge of more than £2,600 to my credit card to pay for a replacement.”
This, according to SM, was the start of a four-month-long struggle to try and get the charge overturned, based on their claim that the AA’s report stated that it was “highly unlikely” that the fault had developed during their five-mile trip.
Green Motion apparently argue that the motor was fine when it left their depot, but SM suggests that the warning light was triggered when they got above 40mph, which the car likely did not do while in central London.
However, when approached by the Guardian, the firm appeared to reverse course, saying that the issue was caused by poor driving but was not necessarily the result of SM’s action.
A spokesperson said: “With this in mind, Green Motion UK will not only waive the repair charge but will offer SM the opportunity to hire from Green Motion here in the UK, free of charge, to go some way to reinstating his confidence in our brand.”
The brand also offered an apology and said its UK staff will be retrained on the procedure for issuing damage-related charges.
The Sun has contacted Green Motion for further comment.