Renting a car in Germany

[BigBuddy69]

I must have gotten close to 10 speeding tickets and parking tickets combined, from driving in Darmstadt and FRA-DUS route. I have never received any letters from the cities. Only 25 E admin fee from Hertz.

Since this is related to car rental, which app do you guys use to warn you about the speed camera? I literally had to mark them on my google map so I know the location. Would be nice to have something that can warn us.

Waze and camsam PLUS work fine.

[UltraHappy]

Received tons of admin charges for speeding tickets (this is the fee for the rental company having to fill out the form that says who was driving the rental car when the speeding ticket violation occurred). Only the city of Darmstadt actually followed up with me to make me pay their speeding ticket. None of the other cities ever followed up with me.

I've rented a ton from both Sixt and Enterprise in Germany. I've had good experiences with both. Neither one has ever tried to charge me for damage. Generally, Sixt and Enterprise are known to be reasonable and not make stuff up unlike some of the other rental companies in Germany (for example, many bad reports about Dollar / National in Germany -- not in other countries as different ownership but particularly in Germany).

[Takedown]

I must have gotten close to 10 speeding tickets and parking tickets combined, from driving in Darmstadt and FRA-DUS route. I have never received any letters from the cities. Only 25 E admin fee from Hertz.

Since this is related to car rental, which app do you guys use to warn you about the speed camera? I literally had to mark them on my google map so I know the location. Would be nice to have something that can warn us.

Waze has all of the control devices on that route. Once it did miss one flash in the city of Dusseldorf though.

[BadinSweet]

Wondering about whether the renting company charges both the ticket + overhead charges to the credit card or just the overheads. Do the police get paid from the credit card or are you supposed to get the ticket through the post and pay it separately?

I must have gotten close to 10 speeding tickets and parking tickets combined, from driving in Darmstadt and FRA-DUS route. I have never received any letters from the cities. Only 25 E admin fee from Hertz.

Since this is related to car rental, which app do you guys use to warn you about the speed camera? I literally had to mark them on my google map so I know the location. Would be nice to have something that can warn us.

[Optimist]

I assumed that would be the case, but I disputed anyway. They were unable to show it in the actual rental agreement I signed, so I won the dispute. Lucky maybe.

In my agreements it was clearly written out. But you are right, dispute any charge by a hire company.

[BigBuddy69]

I was flashed three times and I received one letter from the rental company and another one from the city of Dusseldorf.

As for the damages on the car, it happened once and it was really a case of damage during the rental. The insurance of my credit card took care of it.

[Triptogamont]

Responsibility for thevadmin charge is a specific part of car hire agreements in all the hires I have made.

I assumed that would be the case, but I disputed anyway. They were unable to show it in the actual rental agreement I signed, so I won the dispute. Lucky maybe.

[Ggekko2009]

Wondering about whether the renting company charges both the ticket + overhead charges to the credit card or just the overheads. Do the police get paid from the credit card or are you supposed to get the ticket through the post and pay it separately?

Just the admin fee to the rental company. You will get a letter from the city sent to your address overseas asking you to pay the fine. You would then have to wire that fine to them. These German cities as far as I know have no way to pay the fine online with a credit card. In the end, the bank wire fee is even more than the actual ticket fine itself. These are for speeding tickets sent to you. If you are caught by the police, you are required to pay on the spot via credit card, no cash accepted. Makes sense since this prevents police corruption.

[Optimist]

Ahh yes Triptogamont, it is the mystery charges which up 2-3 months after you turn the car in. I suspect I got mine on my way to Oase last year. I was fucked over on that trip by everyone. I really enjoyed the high speed trains this year. I drove a lot less this year and I incorporated trains as much as possible. I have my fingers crossed but if I get charged I will call my agency and fight this BS once again. What a racket. It is about making money and not about safety.

That's why I didn't use car hire on my last trip. After my last car hire I saw every (and I mean every) person (apart from me) returning a car being charged for damage. The cars were being checked twice by two different people, even checking under the car with their hands.They wiped all dust off the car so they could inspect better. It was like a crime scene investigation

Question. Why when you pick the car up is it low level lighting but bright high level lighting in the return area?

[Optimist]

Wondering about whether the renting company charges both the ticket + overhead charges to the credit card or just the overheads. Do the police get paid from the credit card or are you supposed to get the ticket through the post and pay it separately?

In my experience the company charges the "admin" fee only. In 80% of cases there is no subsequent ticket issued by the Police. My experience is limited as I don't often get flashed.

Responsibility for thevadmin charge is a specific part of car hire agreements in all the hires I have made.

[XXL]

Wondering about whether the renting company charges both the ticket + overhead charges to the credit card or just the overheads. Do the police get paid from the credit card or are you supposed to get the ticket through the post and pay it separately?

[Pistons]

It seems like they started with the extra charge for speeding last year. I have had 3 speeding fines in Germany, but only on the last one did they charge me 27 euro. I believe I used europcar in all 3 situations.

Takedown: my credit card bank now charges about 12 e for sending me a card replacement in case the date has not run out. I tried that tactic not long ago. I suppose some other credit cards don't have the same charge, but I like the bonus points. These things are annoying.

Indeed watching the speedometer is becoming increasingly important in Germany, and using the cruisecontrol. There was a new camera appearing on A3 last fall for example too. In Austria between Salzburg and Villach it is far worse though. Must have been around 15 cameras. Usually near or inside tunnels.

[HungryStud101]

Ahh yes Triptogamont, it is the mystery charges which up 2-3 months after you turn the car in. I suspect I got mine on my way to Oase last year. I was fucked over on that trip by everyone. I really enjoyed the high speed trains this year. I drove a lot less this year and I incorporated trains as much as possible. I have my fingers crossed but if I get charged I will call my agency and fight this BS once again. What a racket. It is about making money and not about safety.

[Triptogamont]

Apologies for the short novel, but I had some issues with rental agencies last year.

In June, I rented a car in Amsterdam (Hertz), drove all over NRW. Returned the car, no problems at all. That got me hooked on renting a car for ease of hitting out-of-the-way clubs.

In November, I rented a car in Frankfurt from Europcar. Drove to all sorts of places within 1-2 hours of Frankfurt. Hit Dietzenbach 5-6 times. Returned the car, no problems at all, or so I thought. A couple months later, I got a bill in the mail from Europcar, saying I owed them for 2 extra days. They wanted something like 50 Euro. I found their website and dug around until I found a customer support email address. I sent them an email with my rental number, customer number, invoice number, etc. I told them I had paid in full when I dropped off the car and didn't think I owed them anything at all. I got an immediate email response saying someone would contact me within four hours. About a MONTH later, I got another email saying they were looking into the matter. A couple of weeks after that, they sent me a check! It was for something like 20 Euro. No explanation, no nothing. I cashed the check. I have not heard anything since.

In December, I rented a car from Hertz in Amsterdam again. Drove to Frankfurt and spent around 5 days at Dietz. Drove back to NRW and hit several clubs there. Drove back to Amsterdam and returned the car, no problem at all. Or so I thought. About a month later, a charge for around $40 appeared on my credit card from them. I called them up, and they said it "was probably a service fee" if I got a ticket or something. I told them I would not pay for anything unless they could definitively tell me what it was. They could not. So I called my credit card company to dispute the charge. A couple of weeks later, THREE more charges, all for around $40 showed up on my credit card bill. I called my credit card company to dispute those charges as well. I ended up on a 3-way call with Hertz and my bank. Hertz could not specifically say what the charges were for, but they guessed they were service fees for when a foreign country asks them for contact information for tickets. But Hertz could not show me a rental agreement (or anything that I had signed) that said I was responsible for service fees in case of tickets. My bank removed all four charges. Meanwhile, I did get two tickets. One near Koln and one near Utrecht. I am definitely responsible for those. But apparently, you can dispute those fees if they are not in the rental agreement you signed.

So, I think my next TriptoFKKLand, I will probably go to Frankfurt and use the S-Bahn to get to Dietz. Eventually, I'll probably rent a car in Germany again, but when I do, I'll probably drive like an ancient lady with cataracts. Look for me doing 50 kph in the far right lane!

[Ggekko2009]

In case you do not know this already, speed limit is 50 km / h by default if there is no speed limit sign posted anywhere. I made that mistake once and got flagged down by the police. Luckily I was not too much above the unposted speed limit, and the fine came out to 20 Euros. The police was even adamant that they can only accept credit card payment, and the fine had to be paid right on the spot..

At least this is cheaper than getting caught by the speeding camera. If you are to drive around the city of Darmstadt, be careful as the area has several speeding cameras. You will be charged at least 25 Euros by the car rental company when authorities make inquiries, and then you still need to pay the fine.

Regardless, if you are touring FKKs, renting a car is a must, since it is a huge hassle and in some places not possible to get there with public transportation.