FairCar Iceland Reviews 362

Despite bad reviews I got eazygoing experience with faircar. Reasonably good car for the price. Shuttle on time. Returning car fast and eazy with Robbi and Fribbi. Free coffee.

DO NOT RENT HERE. This company is a complete scam. They charged me over $1500 for “damages” to their poor quality car which was present when I received the car, and I reported to them. Rent from a real car rental company and avoid this scam.

Didnt even finish reservation and already was hit by the classic scam - price on paywall is suddenly higher

I hired a car for 5 days and although I had read the poor reviews, I thought I would give the company the benefit of the doubt - that was a mistake…. To summarise:

1. The car hire company is NOT located on the airport and it took us over a hour to get the minibus transfer and receive the car. The minibus transfer only came following a phone call with the company and no one was waiting for our arrival.

2. The car we received (a Ford SUV) was in a poor state of repair. The wheel alignment was considerably off and the brakes were significantly worn causing considerable vibration under braking. There was also considerable body work damage around the car which we thankfully took pictures of prior to departure from the hire centre.

3. The car had done over 215,000 kms, which in part, explains the poor condition.

4. I tried to get a replacement vehicle the following day due to the damage, but no one answered my emails or returned my phone calls from the hire company.

5. When I returned the vehicle, I complained to the staff about the steering etc, but the staff were completely disinterested in noting the issues. I suspect the next person to rent this vehicle will have the same issues.

In summary, a shocking customer service experience and a company that I will not be using again….

We have recently rented a car through FairCar and was really impressed. Like others, I was initially discouraged from using them because of some poor reviews…..My experience couldn’t have been more different…..

We were met swiftly from the airport for a 10 minute mini bus ride to their offices. The check out was efficient and the car was a relatively new Dacia Duster which was clean and ready to go.

Upon return, the car was promptly checked and we were taken back to the airport to our flight. They didn’t try to hit us with any additional charges or made up damage, which I was nervous about.

I can only recommend this company for both an efficient service and by far the cheapest car hire, for a modern 4 wheel drive car, in Iceland.

Very poor service with poorly maintained cars. I hired a Kia with rear view cameras not working, completely invisible rear windscreen, poor wipers for the front windshield etc. Luckily we took pictures of few already existing damages in the car & for our surprise FairCar reported these as damaged caused by us post delivering the car. They never say their office is located few miles out of Keflavík airport while booking the car. Completely unprofessional service. Though they look cheaper while booking but they will try & rip you off wherever they can. Will never ever use faircar again.

Do NOT rent a car from this company.

We were driving an older Suzuki with over 200000 kilometers on it and were incredibly careful the entire time we had it. The rep spent some time explaining “wind blown doors” when we got the car on the first day, so we purposefully treated each door very carefully during the trip and only used the car in the city (taking buses to any outside excursions). We did notice on the first day that one of the doors had some difficulty closing, but assumed it was just because the car was obviously old. When we returned the car, they claimed we had a wind blown door and charged us $3900 for something that clearly was pre-existing. When we explained that we had noticed the door closing strangely on the first day and that we also never opened or closed the door roughly during our small trips in the city, they insisted that their techs would have caught it so it must have been our fault.

There was another couple returning their car at the same time that was getting charged ridiculous repair fees as well. Absolutely a scam. They have so much power over you when you are in a rush to get back to the airport.

After all this the driver still sat there until I basically had to demand they take us to the airport.
Completely ruined our trip.

DO NOT USE!

What a racket.
Waited in the airport for an hour for pickup, then waited at the nearly empty office to receive a Suzuki with well over 200,000 kilometers.
We were vaguely warned about expensive door damage from wind, so although we had only fair weather, never left the Reykjavik area, and only put 225 k's on it during our week, we were VERY careful with the car and never opened the door more than 24-36 inches max. With the tightness of the parking spaces in Reykjavik, we were often LUCKY to be able to open the door 24 in.
Fast forward one week to return time, and FairCar claims that there was wind damage to the passenger door hinge, which will cost upwards of $3,900.00 to fix! Naturally they demanded full payment on the spot despite the extra insurance coverage we purchased, and even though he emphasized that it was only an estimate... If it cost more he would let us know and charge it. 🙄
$3,900 later, we were at the airport with a sour opinion of ethical business practices in Iceland.
Bottom line: FLY AWAY FAST FROM FAIRCAR (or the many subsidiary names under which they do business, presumably to run away from the avalanche of bad reviews that seems to follow them).

Not too sure about other peoples’ experiences here but we were picked up at the airport within minutes of landing, over to the hire depot in about 10 minutes, dealt with quickly and got a good overall customer service.

The car we ended up with was a Dacia Duster, mileage at about 50k, clean, odd bit of damage to one panel but it’s Iceland, not London so we didn’t expect pristine cars. Mechanically seems sound and has just been dropped off as I write this with an extra 1300 happy kilometres, now just waiting a few minutes to be taken to the airport but I personally couldn’t have had a better experience and wouldn’t hesitate to use them again.

For reference, I pre paid about £80 for the premium insurance thing which meant no £2600 deposit was required.

This company is an abomination for claiming they provide tourist services. Their shuttle service from Keflavik airport was unreliable, with only one driver operating the service and displaying a very poor sign which made it incredibly hard to spot him at the airport. We were forced to wait at their sparse and uncomfortable office for over 3 hours to collect our car, with the manager unable to offer any explanation other than "we're short-staffed" - and when asked if he could help his employees to process more customers, he replied that he was busy with other tasks.
When we finally received our car, it was quickly revoked because it was due an MOT and a headlight was out.
Our experience of returning the car was even worse - there are not enough characters in this review space to describe how appallingly we were treated.
In summary: this company has no customer service; their employees have no people skills; the ethos of the company is to take as much money from their customers as possible while expending as little energy as possible.
Avoid this company at all costs - they ruined our once in a lifetime holiday and I will never forgive them.

The custom service is horrible. I waited about 1.5 hours to pick up my car and at least half an hour to drop off my car. The car I got was over 160K miles, way over any US standard. DO NOT USE this car agency. They go by faircars.com or city car rental.

This is an alternative name for City Car Rental—this company has multiple aliases in an attempt to dodge the many, many bad reviews from people they've screwed over. We booked a car through this company for our trip to Iceland. They made us wait for hours in the airport for our scheduled pick-up, and then hours more inside their agency to actually get a car—at which point they tacked on additional fees wherever they could, including a several hundred dollar charge for going over their mileage limit that anyone leaving Reykjavík would exceed. Do not use this company under any circumstances.

Disastrous experience...arrived at the airport we had to wait 40 minutes for someone to pick us up to take us to the car delivery office. Then to get the car, it took more than an hour.
We were given a Suzuki Vitara with over 260,000km, it had obvious signs of rust and deterioration. The braking system caused the car to skid, the low beam bulb was broken, the dashboard lights that went on and off for no reason.
Easy to make low prices with cars close to demolition at the limit of danger...

Esperienza disastrosa... arrivati in aeroporto abbiamo dovuto aspettare 40 minuti prima che qualcuno ci venisse a prendere per portarci presso l'ufficio per la consegna dell'auto. Poi per avere l'auto, è passata più di un ora.
Ci è stata data una Suzuki Vitara con oltre 260.000 km, presentava evidenti segni di ruggine e deterioramento. L' impianto freni faceva sbandare l'auto, la lampadina dei fari anabbaglianti era rotta, le spie del cruscotto che si accendevano e spegnevano senza motivo.
Facile far prezzi bassi con auto prossime alla demolizione al limite della pericolosità...

We were waiting for the shuttle to take us to the rental office and were the first family the driver acknowledged us and told us to wait. He went in and got a whole bunch more people who beat us the van, filled it and then left us 6 stranded for another 30 min. 2 seniors in the group could not walk fast enough and the driver didn't care. The car my son and daughter in law were given was awful. Taillight light falling off, no working USB ports, over 225,000 miles. Never again and beware. Not friendly staff and hard sell on the extras.

I was helped by Anita when I picked up my rental car and she went above and beyond, she showed me all 3 of the cars available to me in the class I rented and I was able to choose the one that best fit my family and luggage. When I dropped off the car I was helped by Klara and she was was very helpful and efficient so drop off was a breeze.

TOURISTS PLEASE DONT USE THIS COMPANY!!!!!

First of all once you land on Iceland you have to wait 1hr to even get to the headquarters. The people that pick you up are RUDE.

We ordered a 4x4 and they have us an old DACIA with 183.480km with rusty and smooth tires. We asked them to give us a new car. They gave us the same car with less rusty tires but with 198.456km and low pressure tires. Even though we told him those tires aren’t adequate for Iceland they told us it is. 4 days into the trip we popped a tire. The EXACT tire we told them it was not adequate.

I CANT BELIEVE THIS COMPANY ISNT OUT OF BUSINESS!!

I would recommend everyone to pay for a better company. At the end of the day what comes out cheap isn’t always worth it.

Rented a jeep type for a week in Iceland and paying €800. The company then wanted me to sign a full insurance for €230, as when I signed it understood was not a full insurance after all. And what did I get: an old Dacia duster bungled and ugly.
Keep clear

Took out insurance with the booking website rather than Fair Car, had to pay a £2700 deposit on pickup as a result. Returned the almost new car clean and undamaged and was then told it was damaged, 3 miniscule stone chips, repair cost estimate £3800 subsequently reduced to £2400. Read the earlier review by Max, exactly the same experience a couple of weeks before me. There is no point arguing, you are 5 miles from the airport on an industrial estate, flight to catch. Fair Car were well practiced at supplying all the documentation you need to claim from your insurer.
So your choices with this company are either a new car you will need to wrap in cotton wool, or some million mile junker that may leave you stranded. I parked up next to some rusty blue thing that I assumed was a staff car until someone with a clipboard started looking over it.
It's been 6 weeks now and I'm still waiting for my insurer to settle. They have received an unexpectedly large number of claims this year. I wonder why?
So, an expensive, unresolved lesson for me. Do yourself a favour, don't be me.
Edit 18/07/23, HolidayCars.com have now settled the claim without any fuss so big 5 star thank you to them. Maybe they will remove Fair Car from their offerings roster.

Klara helped us out with our drop off. She was very nice and very helpful. Easy and smooth experience with Fair car. Would definitely recommend.
- adventure boy