Complaint Review: Avis South Africa

It was 9am. I had just seen two lions in Kruger National Park when my tire blew out. The first rule of the park is NEVER leave your car. This is especially true when lions are near unless you want to be their next meal. No exageration.    Someone driving by noticed my tire and kindly offered to return to the nearby restcamp and call Avis. "Great" I thought, since I had purchased roadside assistance.    

9:30am, fellow tourist returns, says Avis can't be hear until 9am - tomorrow. Are you kidding me??? The kind person also tried to find a park personal to come fix my tire but no one was around. So I had no choice to leave my car and change the tire. I was sweating bullets the whole time. Scariest moments of my life. FInally got it fixed and drove to restcamp Satara where I called Avis. This was around 11am. Again, they claimed they couldn't come until the next day as the wouldn't make it out of the park in time.

(Gates close at 6) Had they left at 9am when the first call came, they would've had plenty of time. Even at 11am, they would've made it out. They say they'll return my call with details. So even though I have paid accomodations up north, I have to book a room at Satara camp - at twice my budget since I'm booking so late - (Avis couldn't have put up one of their employees who brought me the spare?)   Then someone points out that ALL of my tires are bald.

Another passerby notices this as well and mentions this is Avis's practice. I try to call Avis and tell them this, as I'd prefer not to have another flat. I get passed around, put on indefinitely hold, hung up on, redial, same thing. Told to call someone else, again put on hold, have to have my boyfriend call from the US. THis goes on from 11:30 to roughly 4pm.    Finally, someone tells me they are bringing another car, the exact model, in the morning. So I lose one day of my trip to stress and phone calls.  

Next day, guy comes with car (earlier than expected, I'm getting coffee as I have no food but when I contact Avis when back home they fault me for this) I have to fill out a bunch of paperwork, inspect a new car which isn't identical to the model I had. I fact, the seats are so low, I have to pile a bunch of clothes a pillow on it to see over the window.)   And guess what. More bald tires. I mention this to the Avis rep and he laughs. "Yeah, thats how they come to us."  

Then he acuses me of driving on gravel roads which I haven't done. I don't get on the road until 10:30. If you've been to Kruger, you know the best sightings are early in the morning. Typically, I'm off taking photos at 5am so I've lost 5 hours. I drive to my next accommodation up North and am so terrified of getting another flat on these tires. I don't drive for three days.   When I do drive again, I'm constantly asking people if my tires are low and stopping by service stations to have my tires checked.

The first service station tells me my tires are WAY over inflated, bald and dangerous.   Finally, get the courage to venture out again. Two days later, another flat. From a thorn. So have to wait to have it changed (FOrtunately, near a service station) Then have to spend my entire day driving to Avis for a spare. Again, lectures as if it's my fault. "Don't drive on thorns."   There are billions of thorns in Kruger from the trees.   All in all, I only drove 7 out of 13 days and had two flats.   Although I sent a detailed letter to Avis SA, they wrote back with falsified information and denied any wrongdoing. I have since brought photos of my tires to established tire companies in the US and they were horrified.