Best and worst car rental companies in South Africa
Car market information site, Carinfo.co.za has reviewed local car rental companies in a bid to fish out the best service in the country.
The site, which offers information about the car industry, including reviews and free online car insurance quotes, looked at the six major South African car rental agencies: Avis, Budget, Europcar, Hertz, Tempest and Thrifty.
The first metric looked at the number of locations each company has; the second was which services the companies offer; and the third metric included consumer ratings of each service.
It then used a simple point system to score the companies (winner – 5 points, runner up – 4 points and third place – 3 points), to determine a winner.
Carinfo said it specifically avoided price as a metric, due to the multitude of variables which ultimately affect the final price of a rental.
These include the age of the driver, the kind of car for rent, the length of rental, location of pick-up, and others. “All of these will effect your final pricing,” Carinfo said.
How the companies performed
Car rental locations
South Africa is dominated by two car rental companies when it comes to physical presence. Avis has the highest number of locations, at 98, followed by Budget, with 91.
| Company | Locations |
|---|---|
| Avis | 98 |
| Budget | 91 |
| Europcar | 65 |
| Hertz | 37 |
| Tempest | 28 |
| Thrifty | 22 |
Services offered
Services were broken down into 10 categories, including loyaly programs, child seats, luxury cars, accident services, and others.
| Service | Avis | Europcar | Hertz | Budget | Thrifty | Tempest |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Loyalty Programme | O | O | O | O | O | X |
| Child Seat | O | O | O | O | – | O |
| Disabled Service | O | O | – | O | – | – |
| Luxury Vehicles | O | O | O | O | O | X |
| Chauffeur Service | O | O | O | X | O | X |
| Delivery/Collection | O | O | O | O | X | O |
| Accident Services | O | O | – | X | X | X |
| Different pick-up/drop-off | O | O | O | O | O | O |
| GPS rental | O | O | – | O | O | O |
| Additional Insurance | O | O | O | O | O | O |
Avis and Europcar tied for the top spot in the category, followed by Budget and Hertz in second and third, respectively.
Customer Satisfaction
Customer reviews were sourced from consumer portal, Hellopeter, looking at positive and negative reviews, and scoring companies based on the percentage of positive reviews in total.
| Company | % of positive reviews | Total reviews | Positive reviews | Negative reviews |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hertz | 22% | 67 | 15 | 52 |
| Avis | 18% | 551 | 99 | 452 |
| Tempest | 16% | 131 | 21 | 110 |
| Europcar | 14% | 261 | 36 | 225 |
| Thrifty | 6% | 67 | 4 | 63 |
| Budget | 0% | 18 | 0 | 18 |
Carinfo noted that users were more likely to report a negative experience than a positive one, and that most consumers probably don’t make frequent use of rental services, so a single negative experience would stand out.
Nevertheless, based on the data, Hertz had the best customer feedback, followed by Avis and Tempest.
Conclusion
Taking all the data into account, Carinfo named Avis as the best car rental company in South Africa, with a total of 14 points.
Budget, Europcar and Hertz tied for second, with 8 points each, and Hertz placed third, with 3 points.
Carinfo emphasised that its review was not necessarily a scientific one, but rather served to provide data as fairly as possible, to help consumers make more informed decisions when it comes to renting cars.
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