Oh dear. I'm beginning to think my relationship with Europcar is not going to be a fruitful one.

Keen as mustard, I've applied for the Privilege card, which appears to be about faster rentals etc - equivalent to Avis Preferred or Hertz #1 ungold. I also set up a My Europcar profile, and registered for Hire Rewards.

Unfortunately these seem to be three totally competing marketing channels and there's very little cohesion between the three.

I've tried to add my BMI number to my profile, only to be told ???en_GB.character.forbidden??? - which doesn't help me very much. Three emails and two tweets have gone unanswered. When I did get through to the 10p/ minute call centre, I was basically told 'we don't bother to reply to emails if we can't help'.

My Privelige card arrived today, complete with a set of sticky labels bearing my profile number and Leeds telephone number (not in service, naturally), along with an invitation to check over my details (wrong) and fax any ammendments to them.

By contrast, I posted a comment on Avis' excellent blog and received a response to my question within 24 hours. ^