View Full Version : Beware Dollar at Tampa Airport
After arriving at Tampa with no delays on either of our flights we arrived at the Dollar car hire pick up desk only to be told there were no cars and we would have to wait a while!
Well after 90 minutes despite having a prepaid voucher, (From this site) we were still waiting along with at least 10 other british families.
Despite several protests we were told we couldn't have a refund because we had prepaid and for the same reason they couldn't transfer us to another car hire company.
The duty manager spoke to us on the phone but refused to come down to the desk and just kept saying we should be patientas they were cleaning the cars.
To cut a long story short we finally received our 7 seater 3 hours after arriving at the desk and after refusing a smaller inferior car.
Their parting comment was that we were lucky not to be at Orlando as it was even worse there!
Were we just unlucky in being there the week before the Easter break or is this a common occurrence.
They also wanted us at one stage to pay extra to be upgraded to a larger 7 seater[msnmad].
floridadreamvilla.co.uk
21-04-2004, 21:22
You were just very unlucky by the sound of it - we have never had a problem at all with Dollar, at Tampa, Orlando or Sanford.
Ray&Sarah
21-04-2004, 21:45
Sounds as though you were really unlucky, we have been at peak times and always hire through Dollar. We have never had to wait, other than in the pick-up queue.:)
zerotone
21-04-2004, 22:22
Yvonne - What day did you arrive? We arrived at Sanford on the 1st April and it took only a few minutes to receive our Dollar hire car. They did try very hard to get us to upgrade (they do this every time) but we stuck to our guns and were away minutes later.
Jane
huckleberry house
21-04-2004, 22:22
We had similar problems with Alamo at Miami,I vowed never to use them again as their attitude stank,didnt book from this site.
Lesley
We arrived in Orlando mco via Chicago April 3rd at 10.00 pm only to find Dollar did not have any cars only compact which was ok for us as there was only 2 adults 2 teens. Tired after the flight we excepted this had a refund and returned the car empty. But there were familles their that had booked 7, 8 seater vans two familles Manager refused to speak to any of the passengers from the flight and were told that it was either conpact or nothing else until the following day and they would have to return to the airport to pick the van up. Spoke to some of the familles on our return journey and some of them did not have the correct van for 3 days after they arrived. Not funny as one of the familles only had one driver with 4 children. This spoilt their holiday as they had saved for 5 years to take the family on a holiday of a life time. [msnscared][msnscared][msnscared]
Robert5988
22-04-2004, 00:36
My son took nearly 3 hours to get Dollar car at Terminal B Orlando on 03 April. He did get much bigger car than he had paid for though - without charge.
Terminal A seldom seems to have the same problem and doesn't get several Jumbo from Europe mainly arriving mid afternoon
Thats bad, I assume everyone has pre-booked and so they know how many cars they should need and
theres no excuse for anyones car being there
I would go mad if that happened to us as its just bad planning on Dollars part
Yes Chris eveyone had pre-booked and yes their were a lot of raised voices,when we arrived at the desk one of the dollar reps was outside having a cig two only on the desk it took us half an hour and we were sixth in line, as I got the cases and hubby went to the desk makes life easier, This is the first time into mco Sandford was much better.When we went into the carpark to pick up ours no vans or any sort of larger cars in sight.
Beryl
That isnt acceptable, they then knew what cars had been hired and so it was down to them
to get them ready. I would have expected them to do more to their paying customers. I
would have got my mum to sort them out, and boy when she starts
Sorry to hear you had a bad time
We had problems with dollar at MCO in November arrived on Virgin flight from Manchester queued for 45 mins to reach the desk only to be told there were no cars, had a further 1 hour wait until eventually received the car. We had pre booked our car but not through Virgin, there seemed to be plenty of cars for the people at the Virgin desk they had no queue at all. Like Chrisj says they knew what cars had been hired and which flights their customers were arriving on so there shouldn't be a problem
I would demand they arranged taxi's to take us to our villa straight away, I would then expect
them to deliver the car to the villa, and if they hadnt done this and we wanted to go out
would expect them to pay for our taxi's and even some form of compensation
After all you are the customer, they have failed and everyone in America seems to go on about
how good they are at customer service and so I would put them to the test
sorry if that sounds negative or harsh, but they have boobed big time and should make amends
i agree and would fly to Sanford next time never had any problem and the staff are pleasant
If I had a choice sanford every time. My husband must be like your mother Chris I don't think they will forget him in a hurry. But still they did not care its all they said was we don't have the cars but there will they will be ready for you tomorrow, tomorrow never comes.
:):)
That is bad customer service, lets hope it was a one off
We rented a Dollar car at Tampa airport, Christmas time and did not have any problems. We did have a problem with the front passenger seat belt which they could not rectify and they immediately apologised, agreed there was no way we could use the car as wearing seat belts is a must in Florida and they then gave as upgrade.
hopefully this was just a 'one off'
Yes, we also flew in on 3rd April
This was obviously the problem day.
Chris J , I agree their customer service was disgraceful and we set my mum on them but to no avail!
There was only one lady at the desk,the other young man went to tea and 'wisely' never came back.
Beryl ,you were lucky to get an economy car as they didn,t even have one of those left at Tampa. Once our jetlag wears off we will be contacting their customers services to see what they have to say.
Apart from that we had a wonderful holiday and it won't put us off returning to Florida again.
Also Thanks to John & Roger because most of the other families in the queue had paid about £150.00+ more for their 7 seater.
huckleberry house
22-04-2004, 18:25
Mine was 3rd april as well at Miami so obviously a problem day for them all over Florida,I do wonder why they keep taking the bookings though when they must know they dont have the cars.Incidentally our intermediate 4 door car didnt have any air conditioning vents in the back,the children were nearly cooked and didnt stop letting us know for the whole two weeks,never again,a 7 seater for me next time.
Lesley