About Europcar South Africa
Europcar South Africa is the South African franchise of the global Europcar company. Europcar itself was founded in France in 1949, and is now owned by Eurazeo, a French investment company. Europcar South Africa is owned by the Imperial Group, and began life as Imperial Car Rental. Since 2009, however, the company has done business solely under the name Europcar. The current CEO of Europcar South Africa is Dawn Nathan-Jones, who was also recently named the CEO of the entire Imperial Group car rental sector. In 2014, Europcar won the World Travel Award for best car rental company in Africa for the ninth year in a row.
Where is Europcar Car Rental Located?
You can find the head office of Europcar South Africa at 16 Ernest Oppenheimer Avenue, Bruma, 2026.
Which Services Do Europcar South Africa Provide?
Europcar South Africa offers a variety of vehicle based services. These include a chauffeur service, van hire, company car fleet rental, touring vehicle rental, and, obviously, the normal Europcar hire car options.
Europcar Rental
Europcar South Africa has a wide range of rental options for customers. We can tell you the following about their services:
- They have fourteen regular classes of vehicle to choose from, including small cars and people carriers;
- It is possible to rent a car and drop off a car in separate locations (there’s no need to return to the original rental location with your vehicle) though if the locations are more than 150 km apart you may be charged an extra fee for doing this;
- Cars may be delivered to you and/or collected from you if you prefer, though this will cost an extra fee;
- Europcar South Africa offers a 24 hour call centre as well as free 24 hour roadside assistance, in case you should have an accident or require a change of vehicle;
- The Europcar hire Ready 2 Go programme offers you online registration so that you can fill out all forms online and then pick up your car without spending time at the check out desk;
- Europcar South Africa have an executive carport at O.R. Tambo airport with valet parking and liaison officers to assist you with rental;
- If you are a South African Airways Voyager member you can earn airmiles on your account by renting with Europcar;
- Europcar South Africa does offer additional waivers that will lessen your costs should you be involved in an accident;
- There is the option of additional tyre and windshield cover that will mean you do not need to pay if your rental car incurs damage to either tyres or windshield;
- You can add optional emergency medical cover that will give you emergency medical assistance or transport 24 hours a day;
- Europcar South Africa also offers additional rentals for a daily rate, including child seat rental, GPS rental and bike rack rental;
- Hand controlled steering is available on certain vehicles;
- In order to rent a car you must have held a valid license for two years, drivers under the age of 23 will be charged an extra fee;
- It is possible to add optional personal accident insurance and baggage insurance to your car rental.
How Are Europcar Rental’s Customer Reviews?
Using hellopeter, the website that allows customers to post reviews of companies, we found 278 reviews of Europcar South Africa from the last twelve months. Of these reviews, 240 were negative and 38 were positive. Negative reviews centered around poor customer service and unexpected charges being added to rentals, whilst positive reviews mainly focused on good customer service. It’s worth remembering though that consumers are far more likely to take the time to post complaints than they are to compliment. In addition, there was a response from a Europcar representative to every review posted, indicating that online customer service is a priority, and that a couple of reviews were changed from negative to positive after a response from Europcar.
How User Friendly is the Europcar Website?
Navigating the Europcar website was easy, with tabs separating different categories. We also found plenty of information on the website, and particularly liked that vehicle descriptions included info like how many suitcases the car could accommodate. Also, you can compare vehicles in different classes, making it easier to make a decision on which car is right for you. The only small thing that we didn’t like was that in some cases we couldn’t open pages in different tabs. For example, on the products and services page we couldn’t right click on GPS rentals to open it in a new window. This is a minor issue though, and on the whole the Europcar South Africa website was simple to use and packed with information.
Europcar South Africa in a Nutshell
Europcar South Africa offer a range of vehicle services as well as traditional car rental. They have plenty of vehicle classes to choose from, as well as a lot of optional extras that you can add to your rental agreement, such as insurance options and GPS or child seat rental. Customer reviews of Europcar are mediocre, but again, there are mitigating factors that we listed above. Of course, the car rental market is competitive, so if you’re thinking about renting a car it’s a good idea to look into all your different options. Check out our reviews of other rental companies, such as Thrifty Car Rental or Avis Car Hire to find out more!
Main subject: Europcar South Africa
