Compare a credit hire company before you agree

What should I compare before agreeing to credit hire?

Eight things, in the order below. Every one of them can be settled from a public record or a single direct question, and every one leaves you holding something: a company number, a written term, a named process. The answers that only ever existed in a phone call are the ones that get argued about later.

1. Confirm who the company is

Ask for the full legal or trading name, the company number where there is one, the registered address and the complaint route. Then work out which organisation is actually providing the hire and which one simply introduced you. They are often two different businesses, and only one of them is the company you have a contract with.

A similar name, a similar web address or a shared telephone number proves nothing about whether two businesses are related. The CAP Code is applied on the overall impression an advertisement gives, and the Advertising Standards Authority has ruled against advertising that read as a local trader when it was nothing of the kind — so something looking familiar is not evidence of who it is. A company number is. Check it on Companies House↗ (opens external site), and against the firm's listing here if it has one.

2. Ask why they have your details

If a company got your details from somebody else — a broker, an insurer, a garage, a recovery operator — it ought to be able to tell you where they came from. The Information Commissioner's Office publishes a checklist of what an organisation is expected to give you when it obtains personal data from a source other than the person it relates to: where the data came from, what it is being used for and on what lawful basis, who it may be shared with, how long it will be kept and what rights you have over it. The checklist expects all of that no later than the first time the organisation gets in touch with you.

A company that cannot tell you where your details came from has just told you something about how it looks after them. And until you are sure who you are dealing with, keep accident, health, vehicle and financial information off unverified public or messaging accounts.

3. Read the agreement

Ask for time to read the terms, and read them against what you were told on the phone. Pin down:

• the daily hire rate, and what it includes;
• insurance, damage, excess, mileage and fuel terms;
• additional-driver conditions;
• the expected payment route;
• any circumstances in which you could be asked to pay;
• what happens if liability or the charges are disputed;
• what you have to do about documents, or attending court;
• how and when the agreement ends.

The Financial Ombudsman Service describes this kind of arrangement as an unregulated agreement under which the hire charges fall due at a later date, and are normally recovered from the insurer of the driver who caused the accident — with no guarantee that insurer will pay them. If what you were told and what the agreement says do not line up, ask for the difference explained in writing before you sign anything.

4. Match the vehicle to the need

A company should be asking how you actually used the car that is off the road, and what it would genuinely take to replace it. Be wary if an exact match or an upgrade is offered straight away with no conversation about what you need, what is available or what else might do. Whether the hire was needed at all, and for how long, is precisely what the other side goes over afterwards.

5. Check the other transport options

Check whether your own policy already gives you a courtesy car, and write down any offer another insurer makes, with the date it was made. The ombudsman sets the options out side by side: claim on your own motor policy, go after the other driver's insurer yourself, or use a credit hire or credit repair service. A company ought to be able to explain why credit hire suits your situation without telling you to ignore a perfectly reasonable alternative.

6. Find out what complaint support actually exists

Ask for the complaint process and its response times in writing, and find out how far that process actually reaches. This is the point people most often get wrong. The Financial Ombudsman Service says it usually cannot consider complaints about an accident management company for the service provided under a credit hire or credit repair agreement — but it can look at whether an insurer or broker met its obligations and acted fairly when it referred you to that service in the first place.

So there may well be an ombudsman route for the referral and none at all for the hire. Before you agree to anything, find out which organisation handles a complaint about the hire itself — and get its process in writing rather than as a reassurance on the phone.

7. Ask what happens after the hire ends

Chasing the charges can carry on for a long time after the car has gone back. Ask who will keep you posted, what documents you might be asked for later, whether you could be asked for a witness statement or to attend court, and who to tell if your circumstances change. A company that treats handing the keys back as the end of its dealings with you has answered the question.

8. Use reviews and advertising carefully

Reviews are useful for spotting the same complaint coming up again and again. A headline figure tells you nothing about how your particular agreement will run. Read them where they were written rather than where they have been quoted on a company's own website, check how recent they are, look for the issues that repeat, and see how the company answers the unflattering ones. Objective advertising claims do have to be capable of being backed up under the CAP Code — but that is a standard applied after somebody complains, not at the moment a pen is put in your hand. No listing in this directory carries a published review score, and every listing says so plainly.

Could I be asked to pay the hire charges myself?

You can be, and this is the one to get answered in writing. The Financial Ombudsman Service describes the charges as normally recovered from the insurer of the driver who was responsible, and says that where that insurer refuses — because it disputes fault, or disputes how much has built up — the customer may then be held responsible for covering them. Which is exactly why “in what circumstances could I be asked to pay?” belongs in the agreement, and not in a conversation you cannot produce six months later.

Does this directory choose a company for me?

No. Most fields on most listings hold nothing sourced, so nothing here is scored or ranked, and the order is alphabetical throughout. This checklist exists so you can weigh up the written answers the companies give you themselves.