Auto Europe EU Reviews 1,638

The final price was much higher than quoted as VAT was added.
This was very opaque and hidden.
It was so expensive, around 140 euros per day for a low quality Lancia.
This is first and last time I used them
I wrote a complaint immediately but they just said thanks for your email and no complaints after 24 hours of return

Absolutely terrible experience, we have booked a rental with Thirfty under AutoEurope on 2 seperate occasions and we are yet to see our deposit money, absolute disgrace , do not book with them , they are a scam, and when I have tried to ring and email to rectify this issue they have not responded , it has been 2 years on and I am still trying to get in contact with them

We pre booked a car online to be picked up at Shannon airport in Ireland. The local provider was Europcar. I paid for absolutely every extra I could on the website when booking including CDW, theft, windscreen, tires etc. I also paid for free cancellation. When we got to the rental car desk they said I only basic protection and was going to have to pay a high deductible like $10,000 to get the car. We agreed to add the full protection thinking it would be an add on. They made a completely new reservation. Autoeurope would not honor my cancellation and said after their investigation it was my choice to change. It is a big bait and switch. They are a complete waste of money. Just go directly through an actual company.

I am very disappointed with the level of service provided during car rental by Auto One company.
I booked the car rental in Milano thru Auto Europe and they directed me to a Auto One. i waited close to an hour for the pickup at the airport, I had to call three separate and during each call, I was told that someone would arrive within a few minutes, with varying descriptions of the vehicle (a black car, a white car, a car with German license plates, etc.), none of which proved accurate.
The pickup and return processes were highly unprofessional. The vehicle was not properly prepared: it was unwashed, the interior was dirty, and the windshield washer fluid was completely empty.
During the Car return, the Auto One representative pointed out a scratch underneath the left front bumper. It appeared like he went straight to that section looked under the fender and miraculously located the scratch. He then asked me to prove that the scratch existed at the time of pickup using my photos and videos, otherwise I will be charged for the damage.
I would like to emphasize that I purchased full insurance coverage ( what I thought ) at the time of booking from Auto Europe ; therefore, I did not conduct a highly detailed inspection or record extensive close-up documentation of the vehicle, particularly underneath the bumper area. I simply did a general walk-around of the car, and the lower underside would not reasonably be visible from that angle.
Importantly, when I recorded a video from the same angle during the car return the alleged scratch is also not visible. Based on this, I categorically denied causing any such damage and refuse to accept responsibility or payment for it, but they did anyway.
In summary, I travel frequently on business and pleasure and have visited over 60 countries, renting vehicles regularly around the world. Unfortunately, this experience with Auto One ranks among the worst rental experiences I have had and I am surprise that company like Auto Europe is doing business with such questionable rental like Auto One. In addition to the operational issues described above, the representative handling the return behaved in an arrogant and unprofessional manner, both in tone and overall conduct.

I will never book a rental with these theives ever again.
Booked a car through Auto Europe UK to be collected at Manchester Airport 0n 30th Dec 2025 from Budget. We had several issues with the car and Budget were absolutely fantastic with us. They refunded the cost of the car hire plus gave us a voucher for the next time we hire! Unfortunately they refunded Auto Europe and not us. I have been trying since Jan 5th to get our refund and only just now (6/3/26) have they informed us (after many ignored emails) to expect our refund in 20-25 working days, which is over a month in real time.
How do these cowboys get away with this?
No idea how they get a 5 star rating on their own website when I cannot seem to leave a review! You can make your decision on that one!

I booked a car through Auto Europe and collected it from Avis. Despite having paid Auto Europe in full at the time of booking, Avis informed me that they had received no payment from Auto Europe. As a result, I was forced to pay again at the rental desk, and at a higher rate than my original booking.

It has now been eight weeks and I have still received no update or resolution regarding my refund, despite multiple follow-ups. Auto Europe’s lack of communication and failure to resolve this issue has been extremely disappointing.

If anything goes wrong with your booking, do not expect timely or reliable customer support. Based on my experience, I would not recommend Auto Europe. I have now had to involve my bank to try to recover the money.

I prepaid a car rental through Auto Europe for my honeymoon (Voucher 134578722), booked with AVIS in Milan, including protection and a confirmed reservation.

At pickup on 29 Dec 2025, AVIS refused to honour the booking even though it was visible in their system. We were told it showed “€0” and a rental contract could not be generated. No escalation or alternative solution was offered at the counter.

At that moment, Auto Europe support was unavailable (we were informed this was due to holidays), leaving us stranded without assistance. AVIS also did not connect us to customer service despite repeated requests.

As a result, we were forced to make a new booking directly with AVIS under time pressure. The online price shown was €483.23, but we were later invoiced €799.94 for the same rental period, with no additional services or upgrades provided. This is confirmed by the official invoice.

We lost several hours during our honeymoon, incurred extra costs, and ended up without the protection we originally paid for through Auto Europe.

Despite providing full documentation (voucher, screenshots, receipts, invoice), the matter remains unresolved, and we have been asked to wait weeks for a response.

This experience was extremely stressful and disappointing for a prepaid travel service. I am still seeking a full refund of the unused Auto Europe booking and assistance with the excess charges incurred due to the failed reservation.

We purchased full coverage, yet Auto Europe still owes us money more than a year after the accident.

Their customer service is unresponsive and unhelpful, and the claims process is extremely slow and frustrating. This is an awful company with awful service. I would strongly advise others to avoid them.

We had rented with AutoEurope before and were always very satisfied with them. They offer great prices and good protection option. For this reason, we decided to rent a car through them for our trip to Palermo, Sicily, last September and October. My husband chose the Full Protection option that covers everything. Unfortunately someone damaged our car in a parking lot during our trip, so we had to pay the deductible to the rental company, Europcar, upfront when returning the car. My husband filed a claim with AutoEurope a few days later and on October 15, he got the confirmation that they had issued the refund. However, after 20 working days, his account had not been credited. Several e-mails (with responses like “we will closely monitor the process and keep you informed”) and almost 40 working days later, he still hasn’t received the excess refund. We tried to call them but couldn’t talk to anyone and there is no way to file an official complaint. This delay is absolutely unacceptable, and after reading similar comments or complaints, we are now afraid that we might not get our money back. Since the initial interaction with their customer service during the rental was ok, I am giving them 2 stars for now. But we are very disappointed and won’t deal with them again.

I have used Auto Europe for at least 30 yrs. But they have completely changed their terms! They quote "Full damage" protection but then on the next page one reads the EXTRA money has to be paid to really get a $0 deductible! Their use of "full" protection is completely misleading. Now it is also impossible to get an intelligent agent. I will not do business again with them..

If everything goes well, it's a good platform. However, if you have issues, I strongly discourage everybody from going via this platform.
During the reservation process, the website explicitly states that the credit card of the payment does not necessarily need to be the same as for the deposit, i.e. the main driver.
That said, I booked with my credit card for my father. Arriving at the pick-up station of Europcar, the car was refused as everything needed to be on the same name and credit card. Even after more than 30 minutes on the phone and countless statements by Europcar that this is their policy, we ended up booking a completely new car for a way higher fee. Still waiting for Autoeurope to respond!

I rented and paid online for an Audi A5. When I got to the rental office they asked me for a premium credit card, not the one I paid with. They didn't give me the car I paid for because I didn't have the premium credit card. They gave me a lousy family Alfa Romeo instead of a luxury Audi A5. I've been asking for a payback for the different level of cars. They offered 40$ for the difference and still haven't paid me that. It's been 4 months!!

When booking a car with border crossing option at Dusseldorf Airport for 4 days, the down payment was increased from 900 Euro to 2000 Euro + payment of 100 Euro for the border crossing itself.
The down payment would be blocked on my card for maximum 30! workingdays after returning the car.
I booked the car and an insurance via AutoEurope. When picking up the car it was stated that the insurance of AutoEurope had no value. For this Flex to go offered me a full coverage insurance for an additional 190 Euros (but with the advantage of 0 down-payment)

In the end the renting of the car turned out to be 4x more expensive as planned!
When complaining to AutoEurope they just generaly stated that with border crossing being charged directly by them and me agreeing on an additional insurance locally, they delivered as contracted.......

Having an awful time getting a refund for a failed booking. It is now 8 weeks after my car was not available.
Credit card company involved now. Will never use again. You want my advice? Go on their website, find out who is cheapest for the category car you want and go direct with that firm. That way if anything goes wrong you get your money back straight away.

They lied about their insurance coverage and they make it impossible to file a claim. They will play you until you give up on any grievances. AutoEurope is a third party reseller. Best to book directly with the rental car company as it’s the same price in the end.

Update
We have finally received the full refund .

No customer service.
We rented a car with full insurance , on return the company said there was damage(tiny mark) for which we were charged over 800e.
I have submitted the report to have it refunded as per our insurance. This was over 2 weeks ago. I still have not heard from them and not even an acknowledgment of receiving the request. When I phone it says it is not possible to speak to someone as the queue is too long. I phoned through to sales and they said I will just have to wait to hear from them with no explanation or expected timeline. I will NOT rent again with this company.

I paid the rental fee using my debit card, but because I couldn’t provide a credit card at pickup, they refused to give me the car—despite having already charged me. I had also paid for extras like full insurance, but trying to request a refund through their website was a nightmare. No support, no resolution. I ended up having to rent from another company. Extremely disappointing and frustrating.

Our vehicle was given away as from Alamo by Enterprise as our flight was delayed 3 hours. We had to pay more for an alleged upgrade vehicle. When dropping the car in Palermo, there was an attendant that took the keys but would not give us a receipt as they weren't officially opened. 4 days later we received a charge for alleged damage to the vehicle. We are currently disputing with our credit card company.

Very good experience with the AutoEurope platform – I have booked cars through them multiple times and never had any issues – until recently. Probably, as a platform, they don’t have direct experience with the individual rental agencies they list.

What happened was the following:

We had an amazing holiday in Santorini, but our experience with Abbycar completely ruined it. Upon returning the vehicle, an employee tried to charge us the entire €350 deposit for a tiny scratch on the bumper. The damage assessment was grossly exaggerated, especially since the car was already in poor condition.

To make matters worse, the employee was so unprofessional and clueless that he even showed us how much they had previously charged other customers for damages, while the car itself was clearly already worn-out.

Upon closer inspection, it is obvious that this scratch could not have occurred during normal movement of the vehicle, as scratches caused this way would have parallel lines. It became clear that the scratch was deliberately inflicted, either during our return in the office or earlier. They even asked for our accommodation address, which is highly unusual – in over 30 years of renting cars worldwide, we have never encountered this.

In short: they created damage and attempted to steal the full deposit. This is a scam. Avoid Abbycar – they will try to rip you off.

I booked a car through AutoEurope with Keddy/Europcar at Mulhouse Airport in France.
According to the voucher, all taxes were included, including the airport surcharge fee.

However, after returning the car, Europcar charged me an additional premium location fee and an environmental contribution, totaling around €26.

I contacted AutoEurope, and they replied that there could be some implicit taxes — which I consider to be a misleading commercial practice under EU consumer law.
After submitting a claim to have these fees refunded, I never received any further response from AutoEurope.

I also contacted Europcar directly, but they referred me back to AutoEurope, leaving the issue unresolved.