Thursday the 31st of Dec - the first day of my WA road trip

Had breakfast with Amy and then she gave me a lift to the AVIS car rental office where I had made a reservation for a car via the phone the day before (I have long wanted to do a road trip of the South West of Australia and this would soon be a reality). Amy had to go looking for a backpack because her and James were going on a hiking tour in Tasmania a few days later on.

I thanked her for having accommodated me and for all the fun we had had the past few days and she drove off, only having to return 45 min later when the AVIS lady made a mistake with my credit card and I could no longer use it to pay for the car rental.

AVIS office bummer -

I had to call my Danish bank to ask them why my card had been declined and they told me that an amount of five hundred something US dollars had been requested from my account and then straight afterwards an amount of seven hundred something Australian dollars had been requested as well. And when this happens the bank declines the card due to belief of credit card fraud.

It turns out that the AVIS lady had tried to request the car rental fee in US dollars via the computer in some way and when this didn't go through straight away, instead of waiting for confirmation, she tried requesting the amount via the phone in Australian dollars. She told me that she didn't know this was the case and couldn't understand the fuss. I had to explain her what she had done and all she said was 'ooohh' and then asked one of her colleagues if that had ever happened to them before. And fortunately it had, since it seemed like she wouldn't believe what I told her :-(

But now I wasn't able to use my credit card to pay for the car rental because the max spending limit of the day's withdrawal had been used - and in the bank's system I wasn't able to make any withdrawals until the next day. I was sooo bummed out!

I called Amy and explained the situation asking if she had time to come get me and she was at the AVIS office within 15 min, so so very kind of her. I asked the AVIS ladies if I was able to pay for the car rental in cash the day after or when I returned to Perth and they said that yes this would be possible but they still needed to put a hold on the total amount of the car rental on a credit card to secure the monies. I told them that I was no longer able to do this due to the mistake THEY had made with my credit card but this didn't change the fact that they couldn't help me if I didn't have a credit card registered for my car rental.

I think Amy saw how miserable I looked and felt by having to stall the Road trip that I had been talking about for so long and she asked if she was able to use her credit card as a warranty and put a hold on her card. The AVIS ladies agreed if Amy signed a waiver stating that it was ok to hold the monies on her card until I had paid the full amount arriving at Perth Airport where the car had to be returned.

And so it was that Amy signed the waiver and I was lucky enough to be able to start my Road Trip of the Southern West Australia anyway regardless of their mindless mistake with my credit card.

A huge thanks to Amy - you're such a sweetheart :-)

- Epilogue -

And I did pay the full amount in cash arriving at Perth airport 12 days later but of course the AVIS office in Perth city had made the mistake of using Amy's credit card details for my car rental when I returned with the car, even though I told them before parking the car at the airport office that I wasn't going to pay with the credit card stated in my contract but I wanted to pay cash.

The guy that inspected the car on arrival told me that everything was fine and I just had to go to the car rental counter at their carpark to pay the invoice. When I came to the car rental counter at the carpark they told me that the invoice would be paid with the credit card stated in my contract and that I wasn't able to pay by cash at the carpark counter but had to go to the counter they had located inside the airport. Soo then I went to the AVIS counter inside the domestic airport and the counter was closed and there was a sign referring to a counter in another terminal. Ooohhh my god!

It didn't really leave the impression of a company that I wanted to use again, ever…

Finally, I found the AVIS counter in the other terminal and told the lady at the counter that I wanted to pay in cash for the car rental - she then told me that I had nothing to worry about because the invoice had already been paid with the credit card stated in the contract.

I really really had to pull myself together not to rip her head right off (but it wasn't her mistake that the AVIS office in Perth hadn't written anything about Our agreement with paying in cash). I mustered all my strength and explained that the credit card had only been used as a warranty for the car rental and this should have been stated in the contract. Apparently she didn't have the additional page with this information on her computer. And I had to explain the situation with the AVIS office in Perth and that they had told me that I could pay cash at the airport and that AVIS would then take away the hold on Amy's credit card.

I'm not quite sure if AVIS had actually withdrawn the amount from Amy's card but after having paid the entire car rental amount in cash the AVIS lady told me that it would take a few days to release the monies back into Amy's credit card - and I texted Amy to tell her that I had paid for the rental and that I was, once again very grateful for her help.