Excellent customer service by Alex Serge
The car was not read. The rental asked me to come back the day after. I cancelled the reservation. BR,
I booked a car on 278 eur and had to pay 660 eur for a vehicle they prepared for me. Had no other option at the Dakar airport 4 AM. Vehicle was old, bumped from all sides, noisy, far from something what you expect from Hertz and Kayak. Lady at the counter was ok and polite, but se's not a customer's problem solver, she only delivers what is prepared. So, more than double rate comparing to what is booked, inadequate vehicle by it's condition, poor looks and unsafe feeling for driver/passenger. I'm very interested what Kayak and Hertz will do on this case. Explanations like 660 eur with 600 free km included is better than 278 eur +0.38 eur/km does not work. Because of feeling unsafe in this vehicle I had to change my vacation plans and did only 375 km in 6 days of rent. Very unpleasant experience!
When my vehicle wasn't available, they told me I had two choices: wait for a car to be returned (may happen/ may not) or pay more for an upgrade. Being pressed for time I paid, but only because they refused to honor the original reservation .
the price was double than what you quoted me
TLDR-the car was a total wreck, literally the only thing working properly was the radio. Pickup was a disaster, drop off smooth. Hertz Dakar forgot our reservation and so had to drive the car to the office from the garage after we arrived. This took over an hour, and put us in the middle of Friday prayers so we had to wait more. I budgeted two hours for pickup but total round trip time (from Mammelles) was four hours. The car itself was more a rent-a-wreck than a rental car. Basically every maintenance light that could be on was on. The car had obvious been in a front-impact collision and the driver’s door would only stay closed if pulled very gently and then locked. The A/C wheezed out tepid air, which didn’t actually cool and the whole dashboard vibrated when the fan was turned past a certain point. The car maxed out at 100km/hr and vibrated furiously while there. We had to creep over speed bumps for fear that the suspension would collapse. I’m shocked that this car was on the road let alone a rental, even by Senegal standards it was quite poor. Positives: Drop off was smooth The car had a fire extinguisher and all the reflector triangles it should.
