CAR RENTAL REVIEWS ON THRIFTY IN ISTANBUL

Great service! Very enthusiastic! The car pick-up and return process was smooth and I am very satisfied with this car rental experience!

Firstly, I think the information on the QEEQ website is very problematic and does not match the actual situation. 1. The car pickup point at the Asian airport is not only outside the airport but also 3 kilometers away. You must call the car rental company to have someone bring the car. This is extremely inconvenient for those of us who do not want to buy a SIM card and are not allowed to use international roaming. 2. QEEQ insisted that we need an international driving permit before the trip. After repeatedly calling internationally and upon arriving in Turkey, we were told that a translation document suffices. 3. The manager of the car rental company was very enthusiastic, but one guy was very cunning, trying to persuade us to refuel with the best gasoline, although regular gasoline would have been fine. No other upselling; overall, it felt good.

Service is good, and the car is in good condition. However, they strongly recommend buying additional insurance (we bought it through QEEQ), which seems misleading.

After getting off the plane, passing through customs, and collecting our luggage, we saw a row of rental car company counters about 100 meters away in the arrivals hall. An employee from Thrifty seemed inexperienced and was unsure of what information to enter into the computer form. He kept pushing for additional insurance. The whole process of picking up the car took over an hour, and they placed a 750 Lira hold on my credit card. The notarized Chinese driver's license that I had painstakingly prepared in advance was not needed; showing the original Chinese driver's license was sufficient. After completing the paperwork, the rental company did not require us to take a shuttle; they directly brought the car to the airport arrivals parking lot. The car was a Hyundai with 10,000 kilometers on it, still fairly new. When we refueled for the first time, we realized it was a diesel car. When returning the car, we couldn't find the 'Return Car' sign, so we drove directly into the airport parking lot and went to the counter to return it. It was very convenient, but we had to pay an additional parking fee of around ten liras. In Turkey, every vehicle is equipped with an automatic toll module; there are no manual toll collectors. There are two toll companies, and our car was registered under HGS. We just had to pass through the HGS gates at toll points. However, twice when entering, the green light did not turn on, indicating that the toll module was not detected, which caused the sensor to beep at the exit. We were fined 33 liras for each of these instances. Normally, four hours on the highway costs only 12 liras. Yesterday, my credit card was charged a total of 75 liras for tolls, which is not too much.

Pickup was convenient, got a free upgrade to a Renault Flu. Lost the car keys in Antalya, but got the car towed to a locksmith company and had the entire locking system replaced. Fortunately, I bought full insurance coverage before the trip, so all the costs were covered.

Very reasonable prices