Avant Car レビュー 

Despite their good rating on Booking.com, their business practices amount to a total scam.

1) When you arrive at the counter, the salesperson tries to scare you by pointing to a sign stating that with the basic package, the maximum excess in the event of a problem is €4,000—which is a complete lie; the maximum is actually €1,700, as stipulated in the contract.

2) The second step in their manipulation tactic: if you are from a country like France—where most payment cards are debit rather than credit cards—they tell you that since they cannot place a hold on funds on your card, you must purchase the €500 insurance policy to pick up the car. Any attempt to find a compromise (including offering to pay the full excess amount upfront) is rejected...

3) Then comes the salesperson's real scam: I eventually took out my corporate payment card, thinking it might qualify as a credit card. The salesperson pretended to test it but handed it back almost immediately, claiming it didn't work.

4) Fortunately, we had the presence of mind to leave the office for a few moments to think things over. The salesperson, looking very confident, told us he was certain we would come back.

5) We did come back—BUT only to tell him that, after checking, my corporate card was indeed a credit card. He tried again, this time more seriously, and—surprise, surprise—it worked on the first attempt.

In short, the salesperson was completely dishonest—a perfect reflection of the company, Avant Car. The scheme is too well-rehearsed and systematic (see previous reviews) to be the work of just one individual.

Furthermore, as noted in other reviews, when handing over the keys, they don't do a walk-around inspection of the car; instead, they try to get you to sign a report stating that the vehicle has no defects. Having no faith in their practices, we spotted three distinct scratches and made sure they were noted down. Naturally, upon our return, they did a full walk-around of the vehicle using a phone flashlight...

What unnecessary stress during a vacation—fellow holidaymakers, steer clear of this place; seriously, stay away.

My experience with Avant Car would have been excellent if it had not been for the car I was given.

I booked a VW T-Roc or similar, in the IFAR category, but was given a Renault Captur. In the wider rental and automotive market, the Captur is generally positioned below the T-Roc.

I understand that rental companies have some freedom in how they classify vehicles within their own fleets. However, I believe this information should be transparent to customers, either by publishing the fleet together with its ACRISS/IFAR classifications, or by clearly listing at the time of booking the models that may actually be supplied.

Otherwise, customers may understandably feel that more expensive and better-positioned cars are used to advertise a category, while lower-value models are ultimately provided.

Everything was a complete disaster!

We were given a different and smaller car than the one we had booked. The car was dirty, and the child seat was also in a very poor condition. Although the car had ISOFIX, the child seat provided did not and could not be properly secured. This was especially concerning as we were travelling with two children.

Although the car itself was relatively new, it was in a surprisingly poor condition. The tire pressure warning light was on the entire time, which was very concerning.

What was even more disappointing was the way the staff handled the situation. They were not helpful at all and showed absolutely no understanding or willingness to find a solution. Our flight arrived as scheduled around midnight, and despite travelling with two children and facing these serious problems, we received no assistance whatsoever.

Overall, this was a terrible and, in the end, very expensive experience. The service provided was extremely poor and absolutely not worth the price. I would strongly advise against using this company.

I booked a VW T-Roc on avantcar.si six weeks ahead of a 17-day family trip (booking #26-362-4498, €1,079.93). Avant Car's email said my booking "has been processed." It also contained one line requiring a reply within 24 hours. I missed that line — my fault.

Here is what Avant Car owns: no reminder. No expiration notice. Nothing. Their system knew the instant my reservation silently died, and said nothing for six weeks — while "processed" sat in my inbox.

I discovered 48 hours before landing in Ljubljana with my wife and two small children that we had no car. The remedy offered: rebook on the website. Same car, same dates: €1,981.50 (booking #26-362-6075). The €901.57 difference — created entirely by their own silent process — was all mine.

I asked the booking office to honor the original price: refused. I asked at the airport counter: the manager was "out," and the stand-in who promised to email him never came back with an answer. On July 31 I wrote personally to founder Matej Čer and director Gašper Žvan with a simple, fair request. No bounce. No reply. Three weeks of silence from the top — which told me the first silence wasn't a glitch.

To be fair: the counter staff were professional, the car was fine, pickup and return were smooth. The second star belongs to the people who did their jobs.

But my mistake was missing one line in one email. Avant Car's was never sending the two sentences — "your booking has expired" — that would have saved my family €900. Only one of us paid for both.

Complaints are filed with the Tržni inšpektorat RS and with econsumer.gov, the US FTC's portal for cross-border consumer disputes.

I'll update this review if Avant Car ever breaks the silence — though when I mentioned at the counter that I'd written to the owner, the stand-in manager's answer may have said it all:

"I don't expect you will hear from him."

They rent me an e-car with 300km range. This information wasn’t provided at the booking stage, it was told to me at the car pick up. The trip it’s been a nightmare due to the short range and the fact that most of the charging stations were not working.
At the rerun car point, the team at the desk did nothing at all when I explained the situation and the issues I had.

Facturation d'environ 400€ pour une micro rayure.
Ne louez pas par cette enseigne.

Nos engañaron y estafaron. Alquilamos 2 coches de Avant Car este verano en Eslovenia a través de la plataforma Discover Cars. Lo dejamos todo pagado por adelantado, incluido un seguro adicional de cobertura total. Solo teníamos que llegar al aeropuerto con los contratos y recoger. Pero nos empezaron a marear con los carnets de conducir, nos "obligaron" a contratar su propio seguro, se aprovecharon de las barreras del idioma cuando les pedíamos explicaciones... en resumen, no pudimos llevarnos los coches sin pagar otros 570 euros. Nos dijeron que parte de ese dinero se nos devolvería al entregar los vehículos pero nuestra siguiente sorpresa fue que finalmente no nos han devuelto ni un euro. Alegan que como pagamos con tarjeta de débito y no de crédito, no se devuelve. Pero en ningún momento nos advirtió el chico de ésto al vernos pagar. Unos sinvergüenzas de primer nivel. Total, que los coches nos salieron por un dineral y nadie nos ha ayudado a resolverlo. La plataforma también se ha lavado las manos. Una indefensión absoluta. Nada recomendables39!!

I booked a VW T-Roc for five days through Auto Europe and had already purchased their additional insurance. I therefore expected the rental to be fairly straightforward.

There were some positives. The car was clean, in good condition and worked perfectly throughout the rental. The return process was also smooth. The main reason I chose Avant was their convenient location in central Ljubljana.

Unfortunately, the experience at pickup was very different.

I was told that without Avant's own Carefree insurance, I would have a very large deposit and would need a police report even for relatively minor damage caused by someone else — for example, if somebody hit the car door while it was parked during a weekend trip to a national park. I found these conditions excessive and the sales approach felt designed to make declining their additional insurance very uncomfortable.

I eventually paid for the Carefree package, despite already having additional insurance through Auto Europe. The employee told me that with Carefree I would not need to report minor damage. After checking Avant's written terms afterwards, this does not appear to be what the terms actually say.

I was also specifically told that the €200 deposit would be released within a couple of days. In reality, it took 25 days.

Another concern was the pickup location itself. The car was parked in a very tight underground garage with limited space around it. I was told I did not need to take my own photos, but in those conditions I can easily imagine how difficult it would be to notice every small scratch or dent before driving away.

The whole experience left me with the impression that the insurance and damage policy is an important additional source of revenue rather than simply customer protection. The sales tactics felt unnecessarily aggressive and, in my case, some of the information I was given verbally did not match what I later found in the written conditions.

For these reasons, I cannot recommend Avant Car.

If you are considering renting a car in central Ljubljana, I would personally rather travel to the airport and rent from a well-known international company with clearer and more predictable terms.

Slovenia itself is absolutely wonderful, and everyone else I met during the trip was friendly and welcoming. Unfortunately, this rental experience was the negative exception.

We were a little worried after booking as saw some negative reviews on other sites. Genuinely don’t understand why! The guys on the desk at Ljubljana were really helpful and friendly, the (late night) up was smooth, I’m sorry I didn’t get the person’s name but the young man who showed us to our car was we great. Likewise we dropped off at Zagreb and the person there (Rok) was equally as friendly and helpful. Thoroughly recommend, ignore any bad reviews.

We had an excellent experience with Avant Car in Ljubljana. The service was professional, efficient, and friendly from start to finish. Everything about the rental process was smooth and hassle-free.

A special thank you to David, who went above and beyond to help us. He was incredibly kind, patient, and attentive, making sure all our questions were answered and that we had everything we needed. His outstanding customer service made a real difference and turned a great experience into an exceptional one.

We highly recommend Avant Car in Ljubljana and especially David. Thank you for making our trip even better!

Picked it up from the city in a dark garage. Went over the car with the worker who never checked the top, walked away as we tried to call him back when we found another scratch. Upon returning to the airport the first place the guy went was the top of the car and claimed there were scratches from a cat. Microscopic very surface level scratches that the first guy never checked. We didn’t take a video of the top and even if we did it was a dark garage and wouldn’t have shown. Charged us $250, claimed they gave us a discount from $1200. Absolute racket. Would not recommend. We plan to fight with credit card company upon our return. Do not rent from this company. The car had a ripped off charging cover and melted leather interior that also weren’t noted on the report and we had to prove from our video. Started shouting at us when we balked at the charges

AVOID this company. I would give it 0 stars if that was an option. We received the car in a dark car park where it was almost impossible to check for damage. When we dropped it off they charged €400 (including a €100 “administration fee”) for a tiny scratch underneath the front of the bumper. The guy got down on his hands and knees shining his phone torch to find it. When I asked what the administration fee was for, the woman with short hair at the desk got angry and said it’s for their insurance. When we said €100 euros just for “administration” is unreasonable she said it’s your fault for not getting insurance with us if you get a charge. She was very rude and was rushing us to pay. We have 3rd party insurance so hopefully can claim back but I was so shocked how much they charged for “damage” that was not even visible. The administration charge is honestly just fraudulent because if they are already charging us for damage then why so they need a €100 euro charge to process their insurance. She claimed that we were informed of this when we picked the car up at the airport but we were not. When we picked the car up at the airport we were also told to just ring a bell to get let out of the car park but no one answered so we had a massive queue of cars beeping at us. We managed to reverse out and go back to the desk to get someone to open it but it was such an unnecessary stress at the start of the trip. Staff at both Ljubljana airport where we picked up and the train station where we dropped off were rude and disinterested. Please avoid!

A total RIP OFF!!!
Never use this company. We booked through Zest and also paid their full insurance cover policy . A complete waste of money.
When we arrived at the desk, assuming that everything was covered, we could not have been more wrong. We were scaremongered into taking out their insurance because the charges, if any damage was done to the car were alarming . We had to pay €196 to give us full insurance protection…just for a week!!
The company has a set of measures that if there is a mark less than the size of a pea, they will charge you €800and this ascends pro rata. The escalation of their charges are eye watering . The representative also admitted that the company didn’t actually do any repairs until the end of the season, further adding insult to injury as it was obvious that they must make a fortune scaring people into paying huge insurance premiums or enormous costs for any dinks or scrapes. This includes any marks that might be incurred on the underside of the vehicle too. There is also a charge of €30 if they think the car is dirty. If there is an accident, you also have to ensure that you get a police report at the cost of €200 otherwise your insurance will not be valid.

Nothing on the Zest website which advocates this company gives you the full picture of what the true costs will be .
In the future, we will be contacting the car rental direct and discussing their terms and conditions in advance. Do NOT use Avant!!!

Charged us 60€ because we had to cross the Austrian border for 30min to prevent a 2h detour to our destination.

They deliberately hide a scratch on the underside of the front bumper. The man checking the car went straight there with his hand. It’s a scratch you cannot do whilst driving as you’d have hit something front on and you’d know about it. Don’t use them.

Very disappointing experience. I was charged a €30 “cleaning fee” after returning the car in normal condition after a two-week rental.

The only justification provided was a single photo of a floor mat, which is normal wear from everyday use, especially in rainy weather.

No inspection report or proper evidence was provided to support the charge.

This feels like an unjustified extra cost that is not clearly linked to the rental policy.

I would be very cautious renting here due to lack of transparency around additional charges.

Never again! I rented a car for two days, but the company is keeping my guarantee of 1400 euro already one month. This is there standard practice! So, you will pay cca 60 euro for a car but your credit card will have for one month 1400 euro reserved amount which you will not be able to use.

Never use this company! (Ljubljana City)
We returned a car and they claimed 405 EUR for a very minor scratch that maybe was caused by a small stone while driving or maybe it even were there when we rented the car. All we know is that we didn't cause it ourselves. The bill was more expensive than the rent of the car.
We spoke to the company and the employee were very rude and just rolled her eyes as us when we left.

I recently hired an electric car through Avant. There was a problem with it charging and the company were happy to swap the car at short notice. All the staff I dealt with were extremely polite and friendly. No nasty hidden charges.

We booked with Avant Car through Zest, the car was great, they didn't charge us a cleaning fee (kind of them as it was dirty) and the staff were polite and efficient at both Ljubljana city centre and airport branches.