I was so pleased with myself organising the hire car in Canada. Slapped myself on the back and said 'that was easy' little did I know....
I had my daughter-in-law research car hire firms in America, because she is very good at sourcing things and then I took the plunge. I had the dates, trebled checked, time of pick up and date of pick up and drop off so I was quite confident.
I fell at the first hurdle after fillilng in all the details I could not get a confirmation up on the computer screen. Luckily there was a telephone number for dim wits like me so I rang it and to my great relief a nice chatty girl came on the line and stayed on the line and talked me throught the form on my computer screen.
Funnily enough it didn't compound my mental image of a 54 year old woman acting like a child with new technology I appreciated a friendly voice of instruction and the encouragement.
I did a little jig around the room and boasted to my children that I had successfully negotiated the internet and hired a car! That was on the 19th of June, it is now the 13th of July and I have still not received the vouchers that they annnounced in their email in big capital letters.
'PLEASE NOTE THIS IS NOT YOUR VOUCHER - YOU WILL RECEIVE YOUR VOUCHER WITHIN THE NEXT 72 HOURS AND YOU WILL NEED TO PRESENT THAT VOUCHER WHEN PICKING UP YOUR VEHICLE'
So it must be important.
I was up at 7 a.m. this morning worrying about it because they have taken the money out of my credit card and I recall reading of car hire firms going bankrupt. My hopes are that because I booked with my credit card I will be covered if they are in trouble.
I could do without the stress. It is hard enough after having a husband around for 30 odd years organising stuff like this getting used to doing it on my own without people putting ever higher hurdles in my way.
It took me ages to get my car MOT sorted out when John first died, men have this way of hanging around a garage until a mechanic notices them. I didn't know you were not supposed to stride up to them in the middle of them changing someone elses wheel. After awhile the penny dropped and I now have a very good relationship with my local garage after studying the behaviour of their men customers.
Of course my van blew up on the M4 I hadn't checked the water and oil again I had relied on John to look after the vehicles. A problem shared is a problem halved, I supposse I had better share this problem about the hire car with the firm concerned and get it sorted, worrying gets you no-where fast.
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