Thrifty Car Rental NZ Reviews 

Having booked a one way rental from Auckland to Hamilton, I arrived at the Auckland airport counter to pick up my car. They had my name and the paperwork and it appeared that all was ready to go. I am then informed that there is a $5,900 excess should I have an accident. No, I replied, I have already paid for the top insurance so this is not relevant. Ahh they said, you must have paid the insurance through the website that you booked the car on. This means that if something happens, you pay the excess to Thrifty, we receipt you and then you get to argue with the place that you bought the insurnace from for a refund. When I explained that I did not have $5,900 lying about doing nothing, there was just a shrug and a statement that I was free to go anywhere else to rent a car. Result - I paid an extra $39.13 for their insurance. Then I was told that due to the car being at a premium location, ie the airport, they were going to charge me an extra $45. No previous mention of this and no choice but to pay. Once all this was done, I was then informed that they would hold $200 on my card for a deposit, which i would get back some 10 to 14 days later. This deposit despite paying all of the costs up front.
NEVER use this company unless you like being ripped off. fee upon fee gets added that were not mentioned at the time of booking. My cost went from $371.24 including the top insurance to $426.78 (plus $200 held for some reason).
NEVER AGAIN

The day we came back from our holiday, we woke up with $5,500 GONE from our bank account. Thrifty blamed us for damages to the car - damages that were already there and that we reported at time of pick up (uploaded photos to their system as per THEIR instruction). After a few weeks and a lot of our time wasted, we got an apology - apparently there was an error in their system - and they said they would refund us. YOU WOULDN‘T BELIEVE IT, but instead of a refund, they took out another $5,500. I mean, seriously….. need I say more!! Now 2 months later, we have been refunded most of it, but they STILL HAVE NOT FULLY REFUNDED US. What an absolute disaster. We just want our money back and not having to deal with this company anymore.

Suraj at the Greymouth location went above and beyond to provide me with advice and guide me through the whole rental process, which can be frustrating if you book it two hours before you get there and you didn’t check everything. Note, there was a $200 deposit that they took on my card and returned it after my rental was finished.

I hesitate to waste more of my time on writing this - but people should be careful of Thrifty. The website is terrible (often doesn’t work), the booking has hidden charges (you can’t finalise all costs on the initial booking), when you join their ‘membership’ (blue chip) they don’t send you any confirmation email so you know your details to get the advertised discount, even when you call they “don’t have the credentials” to send you the member number and tell you only over the phone! Seems very dodgy/not legit… I almost considered paying full price just because it was a hassle to get this info, even though I had signed up! I think I will report them to the ACCC. @Thrifty you can contact me if you want to try resolve this (though unless you change your operating model, I think the ACCC should investigate you).

Where do I start with the shortcomings & deceptive conduct of Thrifty Car Rentals NZ, but here I go :-
1. The car wasn't cleaned when we picked it up - even had a big blob of chewing gum on the rear bumper.
2. Was overdue for a service before we started our 3 week drive around the South Island.
Everytime we started the car was reminded with a dash message that it was overdue for maintenance service.
3. The biggest which we didn't notice until day 2 of our trip wad that the two front tyres were seriously bald - so much so they were almost like slicks.
So we were given an unroadsworthy car. Especially considering driving the winding roads of the South Island sometimes on wet & slippery roads with severe drop-offs had we got into a slide.
Was conscious that if ever stopped by the police they would have rightly so impounded the car as unroadworthy.
4. Like others we were ripped off for fuel after returning the car.
We filled the car before during ~15kms to the airport.
Were charged $28 for 1/8th of a tank @ $3.26/L equates to ~ 7-8 litres. This is absolute BS.
6. They could not even read the odometer correctly on their final invoice - they showed it 1,000 kms less than the actual odometer reading. No consequence, and actually showed we did 1,000 kms less than we actually travelled, but again shows incompetence & lack of attention to detail.

Conclusion : Never ever hire a car from Thrifty / Hertz.

****Also own Hertz*****
My wife got back to Australia and we found that Thrifty NZ had taken $345 for "Tyer damage".
We spent ages on the phone and had to cancel our credit card as they were still able to take money under the contract.
There was no tyer damage and they refunded our money to our cancelled credit card which is another 5hrs to do from Monday.
Thanks Thrifty - You are dodgy as hell and I wont be using Hertz or Thrifty for any of my company business in Australia as a result of this experience.
This was a plain and simple money grab attempt.
If you can be bothered spending 5hrs on the phone to get your money back, then good luck.

Hirer’s BEWARE!!!

Thrifty Rental Cars - Wellington Airport.

Nice Car. That’s about it. The customer service for the most beggars belief and is for the most, appalling.

When, told by Thrifty I would have to pay $250 as security for the rental, I had a feeling when it was time for same money to be refunded back to me, I’d experience problems.

To-date, after my repeated enquiries as to the whereabouts of the refund, not only am I being fed inconsistent information and given questionable advice, I am dealing with inpatient staff who hang up during the enquiry and or I am being fobbed off. To add, the supposed advice presented to me, reflects I have to jump through hoops to have returned to me the refund.

I am now in the process of putting forth a complaint to the Commerce Commission NZ. As far as I am concerned this operator failed to live up to their sales pitch, promises and contractual agreement re the refund.

Avoid this lot at all costs!!!

I am sure there are car rental services, that provide and operate a far more superior, helpful and trustworthy service.

Napier - Well what can I say, on 2 occasions - phone call and reception desk (Napier Airport).

Picking up the car, no personality no smile - very miserable looking lady process the papers and gave the key. Dropping the key off, a different lady - very pleasant - smile and said all taken care of.

Phone call - very quick, did not have the patience, wasn't prepare to listen to what I want to say, so yeah I left it there.

I felt that someone there did not meet up to it high standard of customer service.

Thrifty Car Rental NZ will charge you a $25 admin fee for any unpaid tolls. if you drive on a toll road the charge is normally around $2.50.

when Thrifty receive the 'amount due' notice from NZTA, they do not forward it on. instead, "thrifty" keep the notice to themselves, then wait for the penalty fee from NZTA so that the toll increases to $7.

At this point, and this is the best bit, "thrifty" add on their $25 admin fee. plus gst.

So use Thrifty and any unpaid $2.50 tolls will end up costing you over $35 which they charge automatically to your credit card.

This company just doesnt seem to live up to its name, rather than saving its customers money it is exploiting them.

As someone else suggested they should change their name to "Shifty"

choose Apex.

hired a suv 14/3/2020 from auckland airport already prepaid the lady said i had pay$250 deposit for any damages my credit card wouldn't work so offer to pay cash which i had the lady said they don't accept cash i replied what if your efpos doesn't work do you accept cash reply was i can't answer that sir after ringing my sister in law in australia to fill out a form to deposit the $250 i finally got the car one and half hours later car wasn't washed and i have the pictures to prove that. on my return i filled up the car about 2 kilometres from auckland airport and still got charged $15 for not filling car up how they assess that i do not know i will never hire a thrifty car again very unprofessional attitude

Tauranga. Would never ever recommend. Hidden fees GALORE. We booked online to pick up at the airport for $80 and went to pay but were met with a hidden “premium location fee” that was not stated on carrentals.com confirmation emails. We were informed this fee did not exist at their location a short 2 min drive away. When we explained how unfair it was that the price was so different than the one on the reservation email, the employees said various statements including, “well we already have your credit card information”, “you’ve already paid so there’s nothing I can do to help you” and “if you want to talk to a manager you can drive yourself to the location 2 min away”. No matter how many times we showed him the price on the confirmation email, this manager said it didn’t matter. Not helpful. Not understanding. Zero customer service. I could go on and on about how ridiculous this experience was. We just returned the car.

Got ripped off. Booked a Holden Trax (or similar - usually a RAV4) for 2 days from Auckland Airport. , needing to travel back country rounds around Tauranga picking up elderly relatives to attend a funeral. Got given a new but small Hyundai Kona which sits demonstrably lower to the ground than a trax.Staff said it was a "compact SUV", which I never ordered. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A COMPACT SUV. PEOPLE HIRE SUVS FOR THEIR HEIGHT AND SPACIOUSNESS. 110mm HIGHER than the i30 it is based on, this is a small city, jazzy and sporty, responsive, travels well on the highway, economical. In the country - visibility is poor, you can't see through corners because it is so LOW, it has too much front end power and not enough weight at the back - so handles corners badly. it handles like a tractor, cannot handle corners with uneven camber, seating is miserably "compact", NOT EVERYONE IS A TOURIST THRIFTY. I WANTED A PROPER SUV for a reason not a re-engineered i30 SMALL CAR trying to cash in on the SUV market..
Thanks to this lot my passengers could not easily get in or out of the which were too low for elderly hips, the journey was uncomfortable and I was generally peeved about being played for a mug.

We recently booked a rental along with airfares to Wellington from Christchurch taking out the Insurance Waiver covering the $3,500 excess. When picking the vehicle up at Wellington Airport we were asked if we wished to take Waiver Insurance on the vehicle which confused us as we knew we already had it. The explanation given was that if we paid a further $32 per day, it would mean that we would not have to pay the $3,500 excess if an accident occurred or the vehicle was damaged. By not taking this out, we would have to pay the $3,500 to Thrifty and seek reimbursement through the original Insurance arranged at the time of purchase. Is this double dipping?
In addition to this, we were surprised to find we only had 150km per day, however, at the time of booking we are certain it was unlimited kms as we do not book anything other than this

1. Reservation for a car was handled poorly at Auckland City.
Reservation was made via eml. After several to-and-fro emls clarifying certain matters, I finally emailed that I will pick up the car at the stipulated date, time and place. That last eml is tantamount to my confirming the booking. I received a rude shock at the pickup rental office. The agent said that the reservation was not confirmed. He also said cars are subject to availability, and my category of car was not available. Due to schedule constraints, I had to take a bigger car at higher cost.

2. The agent who delivered the car was impatient. He did not explain the unique controls of the car, I encountered some difficulties a few days later as I was driving, as described below:-

(a) The location of the fuel filler cap was not shown to me. Fortunately a passer-by showed me that it is located under the driver's door armrest. How would I know that? Most cars have it on the driver's side floorboard.

(b) The boot could not be locked. Called the office but no response and no call back. Drove for a while concerned that the boot was unlocked. Another passer-by told me that the boot automatically locks itself when I move away from the car. The car key does not lock the boot. How would I know that? A strange feature that was not explained to me.

3. Prior to returning the car, I spoke with the agent and told him that I might be a few hours late, and to charge me for the extra hours. He agreed. I was a few hrs late. Upon car return, another agent wanted to charge me a full day's rate. I protested, as the Agreement showed the rates for the additional hours. He could not explain himself, and finally agreed to reduce the excess charge.

Feedback has been submitted to Thrifty Car Rental twice, but no response.