Economy CarHire

[briansession]

My wife and I had the misfortune of hiring a car through this website in the UK. Aurigacrown, who provided us with the car at Malaga airport charged us full tank of petrol at 81 euros, bearing in mind the tank can only take 60 euros, not to mention how rude they were when we questioned them for their unfair charges.

[rafiki]

How long is the hire for? If it's over 3 days you can return the car full and get a refund of your fuel deposit.

[frank]

How long is the hire for? If it's over 3 days you can return the car full and get a refund of your fuel deposit.

Not what it says in their T&C's on their webpage, in fact the opposite, you can do what you say if the hire is less than 3 days. The fuel scam is well known, I'm amazed how many book with companies that operate it.

-Si el alquiler es de 4 días o más, se cobrará el importe total del tanque, y el vehículo deberá ser devuelto lo más vacío posible; no existiendo la posibilidad de devoluciones parciales.

[gus]

Quite right , Frank.

I use this company several times a year (although I usually use carjet.com to do the booking - it's often cheaper than going direct). I always book the 3-day hire with a full-full fuel option. If I need the car for longer I just roll-over the hire. It's always worked well for me.

[wendyakemp]

I use crown at Malaga quite often, I also book though an agent (BCO).
I always insist on full/full for my five day hire, they don't put up much arguement.
The only thing is that last time I went to their booth one lady was very rude and shouted at me for standing in the crown club queue. I have always done this as I do have a club card but book with an agent. She made me go to the back and start again after about twenty minutes wait so I was not happy as it took well over an hour to be served.
I have always used the crown club queue and always booked with an agent, never knew it was wrong and didn't need a public dress-down, was quite upset at the end of it all.

[ashtondav]

hellehollis.com don't charge for fuel, or rather they refund the charge if you bring it back full.

Aurigacrown are notorious for their queues and the fact that they operate a blatant fuel theft policy, and excess charge for fuel. they also try and flog extra insurance to cover the excess.

These are easy to avoid.

1. If booking through carjet, ask them to allocate a "FULL/FULL" operator. They usually have no problem doing this.

2. Compare the "FULL/EMPTY" fuel thieves' quote with a "FULL/EMPTY" operator such as helle. If the fuel thief is over €40 cheaper then put up with the theft policy.Of course the impact of fuel theft on your total cost is much less if you are hiring for 3 or 4 weeks. If you're hiring for one week fuel theft adds about 40% to the quoted cost if you're only driving 100 miles or so.

3. Always buy annual car hire excess insurance. It's about £50 from the likes of insurance4carhire.

The only way to avoid the queues is to avoid the likes of aurigacrown, record etc in peak times. In fact if you are travelling at peak times in peak weeks NEVER go with these operators. Queues can easily be 1 hour. Outside of peaks they're usually OK, but they recruit the most surly staff possible so expect a miserable experience.

The best "FULL/EMPTY" operators i have used are malagacarhire and helle.

Always COMPLAIN about "FULL/EMPTY" operators. Returning a car with half a tank of fuel and getting no money for it is stealing your fuel and is indefensible.

[ashtondav]

Sorry! Early in the morning.

I meant the best "FULL/FULL" operators are helle and malagacarhire.

You want to avoid "FULL/EMPTY" operators, like auriga crown, record etc.

[probe]

Autosflores from Malaga are very good. They charge €30 for a half tank no matter what size car and you return empty. They've kept this charge the same for the last 5 years and haven't inflated it with fuel prices.

Probe

[yorkie]

For the last 5 years I have always used Marbesol Car Hire. www.marbesol.com. They operate by waiting for you in the arrivals in their uniform and your names, take you to their office via minibus 5 mins, book you in within 15 minutes and you are off! Full/Full. They are on Facebook. I have found them to be excellent!!!