Car fuel charges

Hi all ,

          Just returned from Spain Reus airport on arrival charged 125.00 euro for fuel questioned the fee. On returning the car had just under 1/2 tank was told we would  reimbursed for unused fuel. Email today stated we would get back 30 euro 3/8 of unused fuel. What a ripoff also got a survey from Argus Cars asking how well they had done !!! By the way car hire was from Goldcar. Why are these companies allowed to steal money from the tourist 3/8 by my calculations fuel should have cost 80 euro not 125.00 45 euro extra. By the way car hire only cost 120.00 for 14 days.  

No, the hire car cost 215euros for 14 days inc fuel.

120+125-30 = 215 

is that such a rip off when other companies who don't rip you off for fuel charge up to 20 euros per day.

these companies are all learning the business plan of Michael O Leary

Sorry do not agree just give us the cost upfront then we know just what we are paying. Stop kidding us on that we are getting a deal. Fuel charges are after you have agreed the hire and arrive at the airport. Just let them be honest tell us the charges upfront.

I agree with hugh_man - what you paid sounds like a pretty good deal for June/July.
The smallest car - a Fiat 500 - is currently over €180 for 2 weeks on the Gold Car site PLUS fuel charges.
So the €120 you paid via Argus was definitely a good deal.

But it always pays to check the small print on the actual car hirer website - don't just rely on the agents site.
Fuel costs are often well hidden but if you search around the Ts & Cs you can usually find them.
The cost they charge for fuel is invariable not just for fuel - it quite often includes a service charge.
Gold Car certainly does this.
The Gold Car site has all the info you need on this page https://www.goldcar.es/en/fuel/

But I do have a beef with Gold Car and this is with the €45 admin fee - which does sound a tad on the high side.
And I agree, this should be included in the hire charge so you see a total fee.

But like hugh_man said - they have all learnt from Mr O'Leary and "hide" costs such as this.

But everyone "hides" cost. Just look at the Holiday Rentals websites.
All the owners show a basic cost and don't often include cleaning and other extras.
This way the advertised price looks lower.
I know all about this as we used to advertise with a Fully Inclusive Price which made us look expensive, which potential guests moaned about and cost us bookings.
The market forced us to split this out but now people moan about the add-ons.
You just can't win whichever way you do it!

Hi ,

     No problem but would rather know the price up front then would budget for the cost 

We have just returned from a 17 day visit and hired our ford focus from Solmar. 1st time we have used them.  They offer a full/full policy for an additional 35euro, which you can decide when collecting the car so we compared this to their fuel charge of 115euro (which we considered not bad given we knew we would use the full tank).  We did opt to pay the 35euro.  Credit card statement on our return shows the total cost of the hire as £136.89.  Bargain!!  Will defintely use again.

That was deffo a bargain - but I assume you paid for the fuel too to be able to return full.

Yes we did, and it cost just short of 80euro to fill up so the 115 charged by the rental company was comparable to the cost of fuel + 35euro admin fee.  It just seems better when they are upfront about the fee and give you the option, and of course there are many times we visit and don't use all of the fuel.  Will definitely use them again.

Totally agree Scottebabe - one of our clients hired and were charged €115 for fuel - and they reckoned they'd only used about 1/4 of a tank. So deffo not a good deal.

You can now book with several of the hire companies via Carjet on a full/full basis - and yes it is a tad more expensive but worth it imo