To suggest splitting the rental damage fee?

[Wynter123]

Feel like I'm mad so please - share your opinions!

Group of 15 of us recently went away for a week in Spain - big friendship group, nice trip.

We rented a few cars while there and I was the named driver/card holder on one of them. The cost of the hire cars were split out between the entire group (3 cars total).

One day, we came back to the car park to see someone had clearly driven (very slowly!) into the back of 'my' hire car and scratched/dented it. It wasn't a huge crushing dent, but it was definitely noticeable (enough for us to notice it as we walked back...).

After returning the car to the hire company at the end of the trip, and a tonne of arguing back and forth/phonecalls/contacting the bank/researching every avenue... I've had £775 taken from my credit card by the hire company and received a bill for 'damages'.

Now - whether that is outrageous from the hire company is another matter. I have tried every avenue to argue it (trust me!) with no luck. Tried contacting the bank etc etc but no, the money is gone.

My question is: only three people in the friendship group has offered to chip in to cover the cost. When I said what had happened, a couple of people went "oh no that's awful!" but most of them said (and have still said) nothing at all.

AIBU to feel pretty distraught (and angry?) that the majority of my friends are happy for me to lose almost £800 for something that wasn't my fault and could have happened to anyone? What would you do in this situation? I don't want to create an argument by calling it out but also feel like I shouldn't really have to - is it not the normal response for people to go "of course we will all contribute?". To be honest I wouldn't even mind if people contributed £10, £20... - anything would be appreciated, but not offering anything at all feels really rude. What do you think? 😥

Would this not be covered by insurance?

Did everyone in the group decide against taking out the extra insurance to cover these things?

That's shit. If you'd crashed / got a ticket I'd say that was entirely on you but not for this.

Only reason it's reasonable is if everyone else wanted to pay for insurance cover that would have taken care of this and you didn't book it...

it should absolutely split OP! The car was for all of you and this wasn’t your fault!!

As the person responsible for the car I would have expected you to take out the relevant excess waiver insurance. That cost could have been split between the group. It's up to the driver to make sure they have the right insurance in my mind.

So re insurance - it was agreed when booking the rental way back that we wouldn't buy the extra insurance. (I personally thought we should as I'm generally over-cautious about that sort of stuff!) General feeling was it was extortionately expensive already (Summer hols) and nobody wanted to pay the extra. The irony eh?

Split is fair, thats a huge amount to pay on your own

Also, Im learning from this...

Difficult one!

The lesson is (as others have said) to insure to the hilt in these sort of cost-sharing contexts.

But given that you didn't, I think everyone does need to chip in - this was NOT your fault.

I'd say something like 'I've done everything I can to get it reduced but this is the bill - it comes to £x each, here are my bank details'.

Would you go away on holiday with them again. If you would I would message them saying that they overruled you wanting the excess insurance, that you are now liable and if they want you to drive in the future they'll all chip in now and you'll be getting the insurance you see fit in the future.

Sorry but I would message the group advising of their share. It isn’t a huge amount when divided by 15 but a big hit for 1 to fork out. Don’t think much of people who wouldn’t contribute to this.

You should write a very nice and polite message that since the group agreed not to take out insurance you should divide the sum among all of you. £50 or wtvr each.

Hopefully you should get most of it back.

Some people need things written out in black and white.

Definitely agree with above

Assuming you have a trip Whatsapp post something like 'as you know we split the cost of the cars this damage needs to be split too as it was no fault if one person. Total cost is 775 so please all transfer me x amount, bank details are....'

No room for negotiation. And just then thank each person when you receive payment to shame those that don't pay.

I would say that you wanted to take the waiver, others didn’t so it isn’t fair that you take the hit. Shared it’s much lower and you suggest x amount each. You understand it’s shit, but it’s seriously shitter to take the burden alone when it wasn’t you that caused the damage.

(Also for future, you can buy a waiver from a different company that’s much cheaper, usually about £20)

Right? Glad I'm not the mad one here! It would be £50 each if split and genuinely I wouldn't even mind if people pitched less than that but I think what's really blindsided me is the total lack of any offer/sympathy/help etc from them. These are people I've known my whole life, not as if it's just colleagues from work!

Literally since sharing the cost/update in our group it's been silence. At least reach out and say something!

I really hate asking for money so this is my total nightmare - I hate the awkwardness of it especially when they clearly don't want to contribute a penny (if they did... they would have said something by now).

Definitely not offering to drive again (at this rate, considering if I'd even want to go again... this has cost me basically a whole second holiday!)

Oh I was on your side until you admitted you willingly drove the car without the insurance.

I feel your pain, if they can afford a holiday they can afford 50 quid.

Don’t think it was without insurance, this is an additional insurance car hire companies offer when collecting car .

I think they should chip in especially having declined the extra insurance. Why on earth not? It's not as if you caused the damage.
However if they won't, I wouldn't fall out over them about it. Ask them once, nicely, reminding them that it could have happened to any of you, and hope they get the point and pay up. But unless you're ready to end the friendship for other reasons, don't let it fester. People can be weird about money. My former best friend never spoke to me again after I paid less for her old car than she wanted (it was the top figure recommended for that model and age of car but she thought it was worth more). I wish now I had just not bought the car and saved our relationship.

Which she would have known didn't cover damages. And she also knew her friends were tight fisted. If they refused to pay for insurance then why would she think they'd pay for damages.

Oh no it had insurance - we just didn't take the extra policy out to cover this! Argument with hire company has been around whether this should be covered - obviously yes it should, they are saying since we can't prove third party involvement and nobody left details, it's on us and we didn't take the extra policy that covers scratches etc.

This is a really good take, thank you! Can feel myself getting bitter about it and obviously I don't want to lose these friends over it (wouldn't really have any friends left otherwise 😅) but in the long long term it's not worth falling out over. Just been a bit of an eye-opener in terms of how they've responded (or not responded rather) which has upset me a bit. But - at least I know which ones to lend money to and which ones not to in future!

Sod that. They aren’t friends if they let you take the hit. Spell it out: acc code, sort code, £50 each please, as soon as you can.

This is also a good take and I see this now... However I would say until now I genuinely didn't think these people were tight-fisted; I 100% believed everyone would be open to splitting the cost so it has taken me by surprise. (I also just didn't think something like this could cost so much - never hired a car before and had no idea it could cost this much!).

Totally agree I should have been more insistent on taking out all the extra policies but as we can probably tell, I'm not great at asserting myself in those situations - I just did what I was told when it was all booked which I know was a really stupid thing to do. Absolutely lesson learnt, but equally feel like me being a doormat shouldn't give the rest of the friendship group a reason to just silent-treatment the whole thing and not even discuss it, would you agree?