Raymond sent a message to Darren R. Huston – President and Chief Executive Officer of The Priceline Group – Email Address that said:
Mr. Huston,
On Wednesday April 6th, I made a reservation for an Avis rental car at Luiz Munoz Marin Airport using priceline.com. What followed was one of the worst customer service experiences I have yet to experience. When I arrived at the customer service counter I realized that my debit card was missing, which as you can imagine is a frightful experience in itself, however I had the EBT version and the number with CVV of my debit card and stayed in the line for an hour to pay the $50 deposit as the rental had been paid in full. When I arrived at the counter I was informed that Avis did not have the appropriate technology to accept an EBT, which is surprising since most large businesses (i.e. Walgreens, etc) have no issues, nor did they have the ability to manually enter a debit card. They also informed me had I rented with them directly they would have no issue transferring the reservation to someone else, however, since the reservation was made through Priceline I would have to contact Priceline directly. I immediately got on the phone with Priceline where a customer service specialist and her supervisor informed me that there was nothing they could do to assist me. They stated that the reservation was nonrefundable and nontransferable even if the car was not used, and that it stated in the online agreement that a credit or debit card in the rentors name was needed to pay the deposit. I informed them that I did have a debit card in my name, however, the location did not have the appropriate technology to accept it. I then asked to speak to the next level of customer service agent. They informed me an executive level agent would get back to me sometime in the next two business days. This poor customer service was unacceptable as I was stranded at the airport with no rental car and could not sleep on the streets for two days in hopes someone from your company would get back to me. I contacted the Priceline corporate office and was connected to an executive level agent by the name of Niko, who informed me he would have to do some research into the situation. In the meantime, I paid $70 for a private car service to drive me to my destination and enroute there Niko emailed me saying that there was nothing he could do to modify the reservation or refund my money. This is completely unacceptable. I was already dealing with the problems associated with a lost credit card, the rental car was an essential part of my trip and I had the required materials (Avis didnt have the technology accommodate me), Avis had informed me they would be cancelling the rental after 24 hours and would receive no money for the transaction, and yet Priceline was completely unwilling to assist me. Remembering that the first Priceline agent I had spoken with told me I could list someone else as a secondary driver and use their credit card to pay the deposit I paid another $60 for a car service to drive me back to the airport with my Mother, where the Avis agents informed me that the Priceline agent was misinformed. They would have to change my mother to the primary driver and they could not make the change on their end. As all three levels of Priceline customer service agents had told me that the reservation was nontransferable, I decided to avoid the hassle and contacted my bank to issue a dispute. They are unable to dispute the charges as they are still in pending status 48 hours later, hence why Im appealing to you regarding this matter. Im sure this experience is not reflective of your company overall, as why would you want to steal from your customers. Special circumstances arise every day, and I'm sure you have safeguards in place to address these circumstances, however, your staff was completely unhelpful and content with me paying over $350 for a car rental, taxes, and insurance I would be unable to use. How is this good business? I look forward to hearing from your offices with a resolution to this matter.
Best regards,
Ray
