I booked 2 cars with CarTrawler cartrawler.com one from the 7th-14th December in Cape Town and the other immediately after from 14th-24th December in Johannesburg. When we arrived in Cape Town, we were asked to put down a R10, 000 (1, 000 Pounds) deposit for the excess. I assumed this would just be authorized by the bank but we were told this would be a holding deposit and would be blocked on our credit card.

We were fuming but handed our credit card over. On the return of the Cape Town car, we asked when the deposit would be released as we were renting another car in Johannesburg and would not be happy having 2x R10, 000 held on our credit cards with the same company. We were told that the money would be released immediately, however our bank would only release this in about a week. We were fuming as this would mean that approximately 2, 000 Pounds would be blocked on our credit card by the same company.

I then called CarTrawler (as this is who we booked the car through to get this sorted). They were highly rude and told me that they could not help me as it is up to the car rental company. I explained that it was ridiculous that they could not just hold 1x deposit for the two reservations. The customer service advisor (if that’s what you want to call them) then went on to tell me that I did not have a reservation for Johannesburg during that time, but the reservation was for September. I was shocked. When I have booked the cars I had called their company to find out if I could make a block booking for both the CT and JHB cars or whether I would need to do them separately.

As I was on the phone already the advisor made the bookings for me. After about 2 hours of trying to get this resolved, I was called back by a supposed “manager” who went on to tell me “this is not my fault and I did not take you hand and make you click on the wrong dates”. I explained that I did not make the reservations and that the advisor had but he would not have any of it. We then had to book another car which cost us more money and CarTrawler have not refunded us the money for the reservation which they made for September.

I only can support the warning for CarTrawler. We just made a short break in Dartmoor, UK, with a CT manged car from local rental. We felt sure to be insured because a collision damage waiver was made by CT. Unfortunately we had a minor scratch on a back road, worth ~700 BP (~1000 €) . Claiming the costs we were surprised to find a small article on page 3 of (in 2 points script) that the waiver covers only UK residents. So a thirty pounds were wasted on top of the damage cost. Nice suprise - or jut dirty tricks ?