Car hire in Beef Island, the British Virgin Islands

It was a bad showing by Avis. We had to reject two cars before accepting a third. The first car had bald tires that had wear bars above the tread, and which showed separation between the tread and the sidewall (pictures available). Dangerous! The second car had an air conditioner which was not working. These cars should not have been offered. When it was time to turn the car in, there was no desk agent present, and no instructions as to how the desk person should be contacted. (We were helped by non-Avis personnel.) The Avis people with whom we dealt were polite and pleasant, and did try to accommodate. But the overall operation is very shabby.

I booked a car and received a confirmation by e-mail, but when I wanted to pick-up the car, I was told that there was no car available. It took quite a while to fix that. Nevertheless, it was not the agent's mistake - he was really doing his best - but rather a "system feature" for car rentals on Tortola.

My flight was delayed, I called to let them know. During that call there was no problem, they told my that they would be there and thank you for letting them know. When I landed , hertz was close, someone who works at the airport could reach them. They told me to take a cab and I could get the car in the morning. It cost me 60 usd to reach the hotel, in the morning i called , I needed the car to go to work, it was still closed. It cost me 50 usd to reach work. After work, I called an other car rental enterprise to rent a car so I would not have to spend an other 50 usd to reach the car rental stop.

I could write 100 sentences and I wouldn’t be able to explain all of the ways in which Hertz BVI was unacceptable bad. The short version is without a flat on a tire that was almost bald and I were no tools to remove and replace it with a spare. I called somebody came put a new tire on left me with no spare and no tools, and the company charge me $150 for a new tire and $50 for a service charge. Meanwhile, the right front window went down but would not come back up so we waited in the rain, radio was broken so nothing to listen to, no windshield wiper fluid, a rattling sound from the rear underneath, which I checked out and was a loose muffler bracket. The car was missing numerous parts including coverings for the rearview mirrors and parts of the roof rack. The check-in and check out agent didn’t have a pen didn’t have an office wasn’t able to give me a receipt showing what I was paying. I got the bill later the day I returned it with all these extra charges. Honestly, I should not be paying any of the extra charges and I would like a refund for half of the rental. This was the worst car rental experience I have ever had and I’ve been doing this for many decades.