Expecting a certain lack of friendliness or even rudeness from the French in general and Parisians in particular seems to be the conventional wisdom. In our two visits there, our experience has been quite to the contrary - we have found most folks happy to help and gloss over the fact that we speak no French. As with any large city, a visitor to Paris is constantly reminded to be mindful of pickpockets and when we were there last week, I was in a constant state of vigilance, going through crowds, in and out of the metro, and so on. On this occasion though, we were sitting at one of the tables outside a restaurant that are so common across Paris and having some pizza. I had my phone on the table. A couple of women walked by rapidly, conversing in French. After they had passed us, one of them abruptly turned around and walked back and asked me in an unsmiling voice, "Anglais?" I was a bit puzzled by her demeanor, but understood that she was asking if I spoke English. I said yes, and in accented English, but in the same stern voice she said, "Don't leave your phone on the table" and without waiting for any answer turned back and resumed her walk. Malini and the boys had not quite caught the exchange and I had to explain that despite the seeming rudeness, she was actually being helpful and warning me against thieves who would swipe the phone from the table.
But helpful is not the term I would use for the Avis agent at the Saint Pierre de Corps train station in the Loire valley. First he spoke no English and had no interest in meeting me half way with some combo of broken English and French (I am quite certain he gets a lot of American and British tourists coming through - the Chateaus in the area were fairly crawling with them). Thankfully this was a small issue since our hostess had graciously agreed to come in and help with translations. I had a printout showing our estimated total at just under $300. That included almost $100 in taxes and another $100 for the one-way rental. The guy does a lot of typing, asks if I would be ok with an automatic (most locals prefer manual transmissions), and so on and finally produces a stack of papers and asks me to sign at the bottom. I get a shock - the amount listed is 478 Euros, which is approximately $650 - more that twice my printed quote. When I ask about it, he does a bunch more typing and then says it is because he added insurance, even though I had explicitly told him that I did not want it. The hostess explains this again and after some unhappy murmuring, he tears up the sheets and does more typing and then produces another invoice, this time for 425 Euros. I protest that this is still too high. He now says something about our contract having been changed (we couldn't pick up the car the previous day as scheduled due to a train strike, but we had called ahead and informed them about it). He did some more typing and then produced yet another one showing 378 Euros. Now his reasoning changed. He said this is what happens when you book from the US. They quote the price there, but once you are in France you have to pay the local rate. This didn't make any sense to me since my reservation clearly showed me picking up the car at that location. He then pointed to the phrase "estimated charges" on my printout and claimed that that was proof of what he was saying. I tried to explain that that was likely due to the exchange rate fluctuations and in any case, it hardly makes sense that we would be off by almost $200 (378 Euros is just over $500 in USD). He was having none of it and I just had to throw in the towel and accept the car. Then he said that I should only return the car on Monday morning rather than the Sunday night when we reached Paris. This presented another problem since we would have to look for overnight parking in the heart of Paris, but really I had no choice but to agree.
Fast forward three days later and we actually end up returning the car Sunday night - turns out there is no issue with the early return and in fact, we end up getting some 50 Euros back for the early return. Realizing that the agent in Paris is somewhat more helpful, I ask again about the difference between the quote I had gotten and the one I actually paid for. After much checking he said, "Its because of the liability waiver." Turns out that my friendly agent in the Loire valley had tacked on some liability insurance anyway and now there was no way to take it off. However, even that didn't explain the entire difference. The agent in Paris was trying, but eventually he gave up with, "I have never seen a contract like yours. I don't know what the other agent did, your best option is to call Avis customer service." Not sure if that will do me much good, but I imagine the experience is likely to be a bit better as long at the person answering the phone is not my friend in Saint Pierre de Corps.
But helpful is not the term I would use for the Avis agent at the Saint Pierre de Corps train station in the Loire valley. First he spoke no English and had no interest in meeting me half way with some combo of broken English and French (I am quite certain he gets a lot of American and British tourists coming through - the Chateaus in the area were fairly crawling with them). Thankfully this was a small issue since our hostess had graciously agreed to come in and help with translations. I had a printout showing our estimated total at just under $300. That included almost $100 in taxes and another $100 for the one-way rental. The guy does a lot of typing, asks if I would be ok with an automatic (most locals prefer manual transmissions), and so on and finally produces a stack of papers and asks me to sign at the bottom. I get a shock - the amount listed is 478 Euros, which is approximately $650 - more that twice my printed quote. When I ask about it, he does a bunch more typing and then says it is because he added insurance, even though I had explicitly told him that I did not want it. The hostess explains this again and after some unhappy murmuring, he tears up the sheets and does more typing and then produces another invoice, this time for 425 Euros. I protest that this is still too high. He now says something about our contract having been changed (we couldn't pick up the car the previous day as scheduled due to a train strike, but we had called ahead and informed them about it). He did some more typing and then produced yet another one showing 378 Euros. Now his reasoning changed. He said this is what happens when you book from the US. They quote the price there, but once you are in France you have to pay the local rate. This didn't make any sense to me since my reservation clearly showed me picking up the car at that location. He then pointed to the phrase "estimated charges" on my printout and claimed that that was proof of what he was saying. I tried to explain that that was likely due to the exchange rate fluctuations and in any case, it hardly makes sense that we would be off by almost $200 (378 Euros is just over $500 in USD). He was having none of it and I just had to throw in the towel and accept the car. Then he said that I should only return the car on Monday morning rather than the Sunday night when we reached Paris. This presented another problem since we would have to look for overnight parking in the heart of Paris, but really I had no choice but to agree.
Fast forward three days later and we actually end up returning the car Sunday night - turns out there is no issue with the early return and in fact, we end up getting some 50 Euros back for the early return. Realizing that the agent in Paris is somewhat more helpful, I ask again about the difference between the quote I had gotten and the one I actually paid for. After much checking he said, "Its because of the liability waiver." Turns out that my friendly agent in the Loire valley had tacked on some liability insurance anyway and now there was no way to take it off. However, even that didn't explain the entire difference. The agent in Paris was trying, but eventually he gave up with, "I have never seen a contract like yours. I don't know what the other agent did, your best option is to call Avis customer service." Not sure if that will do me much good, but I imagine the experience is likely to be a bit better as long at the person answering the phone is not my friend in Saint Pierre de Corps.
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