Germany Frankfurt
Hire Cars Should be Pet Free
Since when did car hire firms change their rules about pets in vehicles? I’ve just returned a hire car that my colleagues and I had used to get home from Heathrow, filthy with dog hair and smell.
Don’t get me wrong. I really love animals but I really hate having fur all over my business suits. My family has a dog, a cat, several fish and a wandering hedgehog in the garden. Me and my family all love animals. But when I tried to book a hire car for my family, dog and cat I was told that only certain vehicles were suitable and these weren’t available.
On further investigation I ultimately found a car hire firm that did accept pets but only in certain vehicles (estates) and the animals had to be secured behind the back seat. We were happy with this situation and understood completely.
You can probably understand how dissappointed I was by the hire car supplied by a well known car hire supplier at Heathrow. My colleagues and I had returned from Frankfurt late in the evening having pre-booked our hire car before we left Germany. We collected the details and keys from the desk and headed for the parking lot. When we opened the car door it smelled like Crufts dog show on a warm day. Not nice.
I wanted to return to the desk and get another car but one of our party was really keen to get home so we piled into the car and off we went. It was when I got home that I reallised my suit was coated with fine white dog hairs.
Whoever had used that car immediately prior to us had clearly allowed a dog to roam freely on the seats and upholstery. When I got in touch with the car hire firm they apologised and told me that they don’t allow dogs or cats in their normal saloon cars so someone had broken their rules. The previous driver had clearly broken their rules and they hadn’t managed to valet the car before picking it up. The result was a bill for having four suits cleaned.
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In future we’ll be driving to the airport and using airport parking services rather than rely on smelly hire cars. Top tip: Always make certain that you have adequate travel insurance before you go anywhere.
Frankfurt Airport (Germany) – Landing and take off – Old Video (1991) – Part 1