During a recent trip, I encountered a new and frustrating travel issue, and it will forever change the way I handle this particular situation. Be careful about renting back-to-back rental cars from the same company.
On this particular trip, friends and I rented a car to drive through the Baltics. We returned the car in the early morning in Lithuania by dropping it off at the airport and putting the keys in the designated box. We then flew to Nice France and tried to pick up a rental from the same company just a few hours later. However, our first car was not checked in as returned yet. We were unable to contact anyone from the company and the agent in Nice was unable to help us as long as we showed an unreturned overdue vehicle.
We ended up canceling that car and making a reservation with another company. But in addition to the frustration, getting in and out of lines and trying to make a new reservation with spotty Wi-Fi and limited data took three hours to resolve.
In the future, I will ensure we always book cars from different companies.
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