Car rental; National/Citer and Sixt in France
It appears the French car rental situation is in a state of flux, as my recent research for a trip next year revealed, some of which was explained by recent email exchanges with Andy of gemut.com. For 25+ years I've always used a broker for France rentals, usually AutoEurope or Kemwel. There have been a few little glitches, but nothing much and nothing that wasn't fixed within days if not hours. The agency used has always been either Europcar or Citer. But now when I go to AE and Kemwel and look for an automatic for my trip, I see only Hertz. Because of glowing reviews here, I contacted gemut.com. Andy replied with a quote through Hertz, and mentioned that Europcar would be a lot lower but they don't allow one-way rentals of automatics in France; he confirmed, in answer to my reply about renting one-way through Europcar this Spring, that this policy is only 3 months old, and may be only if you go through a broker rather than directly to Europcar. Going directly to Europcar, I can get an automatic one-way, and at a lower price than gemut and comparable to AE/Kemwel. But the real thrust of my post is National/Citer and Sixt. Going to the N/C site directly, the rate is so much less than anyone else. Which makes me suspicious, especially since my research revealed so many horror stories about them, including some obvious scams. On the other hand, I also checked Sixt, and their rate is substantially less than anyone except National/Citer and I've read many glowing reviews on this site about Sixt (with a big negative from Ed). Any comments, particularly recent experiences with Sixt or N/C?
Robert
Portland 10/27/12
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Rented a car from Sixt for 2 days at Geneva airport last month. Their computer was running slow that evening, so it took a little longer, but other than that I was completely satisfied. Surprisingly, I found a better price by renting through Orbitz than the quoted price from the Sixt site.
Very useful information. Thank you. I too have used AutoEurope for both rentals and leases for the last fourteen years. Time for an old dog to try new tricks.
Does this apply only to automatics?
The major change may be only with automatics. I have not checked manuals since I don't/can't drive one.