THIS COMPANY SHOULD BE SHUT DOWN. WARNING! Do NOT rent cars with Avis Car Rental !!!! HUGE SCAM COMPANY. 

My friend and I rented a car with Avis Car Rental through Rentalcars.com for our two week trip to Costa Rica and it was a HUGE mistake.
The total of this was $177.00 CAD - (paid online prior to) for just the car with no insurance or additional expenses.

When we got to the Avis we were kept waiting for at least 20 minutes before someone finally acknowledged us. Once we started dealing with someone we were informed that we had selected a manual rather than an automatic, therefore we needed to upgrade. The man told us he would do the best he could to get us the cheapest car for the best deal based off of what they had, which we were appreciative of.

After waiting another 45 minutes until we finally received the car we were exhausted and ready to get started with our plans for our trip. We were mislead into getting the most expensive insurance which was quoted $29 USD a day – which is also stated online. When it came time to pay, the total was $931 USD. We were confused how it added up to so much. The man was very short and wouldn’t provide a detailed explanation therefore we figured we would settle anything that didn't make sense when we returned the car.
Once we got to our next destination we checked our "bill" and were quick to realize we were definitely overcharged. We sent Avis an e-mail immediately stating that we were unsure of our bill and that it gave little information of a break down and would like to discuss it when we drop of the car off and settle any differences of pay then. We received no response in the two weeks we had the rental.

We had also stated to the man at the desk while picking up the car that if possible we wanted to bring the car back a day early as returning it morning of would have been too tight with catching our 7am flight. He said that was not a problem, we would get the difference paid back, and that they would be open until 10:30pm the evening prior. When we returned the car a different man was there and said that there was no refund of the extra day to be made because we didn't bring it back by 1:30pm. I told him that the man we dealt with previously never mentioned any specific time frame therefore, we should still be given the money back for the day we didn't use; as we stated we were going to be doing. The guy refused to do anything for us and just shugged his shoulders.

We were also told that the gas tank would not be full as promised and that it is just under half therefore we didn't have to return it full. He continued to tell us that half or under would be just fine and to not worry about the gas. The man said he would put a note in our file to ensure of no confusion. When we arrived to return the car the man kept asking how we would like to pay for the gas after we explained this to him. After fighting for what was previously said to us he finally pulled out our file and saw the note regarding gas and was okay to “drop it”.

Then we brought up our confusion of being over charged and never receiving a proper break down. The man was unable to explain anything to us about our charges. We asked multiple times where our initial $177.00 CAD was put into account of our total bill and he continue to circle the word "INCLUDED" with no amount of money anywhere, again leaving us with no information. After further discussing he then kept saying that our initial payment was commission for rentalcars.com and proceeded to tell us that we paid them that money to FIND us a car through Avis and that money has nothing to do with them.

Other workers at Avis that we tried talking to were saying they could not speak English while laughing, meanwhile they were speaking fluent English to us five minutes prior. We ended up leaving very upset, stressed and felt like we were totally taken advantage of for overcharging us while on vacation. As we left we could see them grinning and laughing at us behind the counter as we walked out saying they had scammed us and that what they are doing is wrong and unfair. We felt so disrespected with the whole situation and customer service.

When we returned to Canada we found that both payments made through Avis ($500 USD deposit and $931 USD) were somehow deleted from my transaction history on my visa.I called my bank and they were also not able to find these transactions until I was transferred to someone to talk about fraud. After looking deeper into things with our bank we finally found out that were charged $1255  at the end of our trip. NOT INCLUDING the $177 therefore our grand total was $1,432 That’s quite a jump from $177. 

We have been diligent with reaching out to Avis and rentalcars with no luck at all. We continue to reach out but are only told “this will be reviewed under investigation”. It’s unfortunate that we read the reviews after booking and realized this has happened to many others. So PLEASE avoid them at all costs and do your research into car rentals prior to booking!