RV Rental Guide
Rent Recreational Vehicles

How binding is this small print?

We made a last minute on-line booking of a motorhome. We were told it was fully insured but we would have to pay an excess of £1250 if it was damaged. Other than that, we were just told to look at the T&C on the website.

We paid extra to take the camper abroad, but discovered this did not include European travel requirements. We had to buy the stuff at the port, but they didn't have lightbulbs for the van. That's an aside, but the worst happened and someone hit the van and drove off when we were parked in a town centre car park. We were gutted to think we had to pay £1250 but now they've hit us with a bill for over £1800. They want £180 insurance admin, and they want us to pay rental for the time off the road, as well as 2% for them dipping in to our credit card still further, and VAT on top.
We dug into the small print and found the £180 charge, and some waffle about "service and time charges at the prevailing daily hire rate, plus other charges"

We've been told by other hirers since then that it is not the usual custom to charge for hire rates when the van is off the road, any more than a hotel charges extra nights for a room once you've vacated it, if you broke the bed.

Some legislation has been quoted about the charge being too much for the work it covers, and not legal as a result. Also that as we were private customers and unable to negotiate terms on the contract, that they had an obligation to draw our attention to these extra costs, and not leave us to find them for ourselves.

We are not trying to get out of the £1250 but the 50% extra is leaving a foul tale in our mouth. Can anyone shed any light on our rights

TIA
B2B
OK. So I got an answer. Since I have 4 different hirers who DO NOT charge for extra hire, I would be interested to know why you think it is normal. What is your background, or are you just the rogue trader?

Public Comments

1. You have the right to abide by your contract. It IS normal to have to pay for daily hire rates while a vehicle is out of service. They gave you the information in the Terms and Conditions, the fact that you didn't read them in advance is irrelevant. In fact, you'd have signed to verify that you HAD read them.

Sorry, you made a mistake, and it's now going to cost you even though the accident itself isn't your fault.

2. The big print giveth, the little print taketh away.

You would have confirmed a document stating you had read and accepted the terms and conditions, if you didn't read them then you have no recourse, sorry.

3. What do you mean by VAT on top?

The VAT should probably only be on the extra hire, and maybe the admin fee depending on what it's actually for.

The £1250 would normally be seen as compensation and outside the scope of VAT, separately charged for finance charges (the 2%) can be seen as financial services and exempt from VAT.

Indeed there'd be a case to say that the extra hire charge isn't actually a supply to you but further compensation to them and so also without VAT.

I'd have thought that there should be very little VAT here.