Worst customer service... and R10 000 poorer for using Avis.

<p>On 23 December 2016 I travelled to Johannesburg with my family, and arrived at OR Tambo at around 23:00. I made my way to Avis to collect the car that I had pre-booked and paid for in advance. I had originally booked the rental car a few months earlier, but called the Avis Rental service desk on the 20th December to change the booking for a day earlier, as we were originally planned to arrive on the 24th. The call center agent stated that this was in order, and that she had included instructions in the text field of my booking as record of our call.</p> <p>When we got to the Avis OR Tambo counter, we were assisted by a gentleman who initially had trouble with issuing the rental agreement. He explained to us that they had not changed the date on the booking, but stated that should we keep the original rental duration, that the original quoted rate would be the same as I had paid for. We left the branch and returned the rental car a day earlier as agreed. After a few days I noted an additional charge of R10 000 and when I queried this, was told that it was due to a rate change. I have been trying to get this resolved and requested the issue to be escalated on a number of occasions, but am no longer getting responses from Avis Customer Service. As a result I am R10 000 poorer, with Avis stating that this was due to a rate change caused by taking the car a day earlier. Had the rental agent advised me to rent a vehicle for 1 day only, and keep my original booking, I could have saved a lot of trouble, and money. This is a case of a large corporate exploiting the public. </p> <p> </p> <p>This incident has spoilt my belief that Avis is a reputable company. I, like others, feel ****** by Avis. Surely this cannot be the case.</p>