So I had booked a midsize car from Friday evening to Monday morning for $0.01 in Bucharest, Romania. That's right, a penny!!

The staff at the B2R location - the Howard Johnson hotel in Bucharest - (and by staff I mean that one guy) was not very professional. He kept leaving and coming back (all this while he was writing up the contract). This was because the guy doing the valet parking at that hotel did not have a driver's license and he was helping that guy out. He kept leaving to go park cars. I thought that was pretty funny.

I had booked the car for 6:30 pm but the car didn't get there until 7:30 pm (they had to bring one from another location, as if they didn't know that a car was reserved for 6:30pm). When I handed him the printout of the reservation confirmation I had received from Budget, he was like "no, that's Budget.com - it's the American Budget, it has nothing to do with us. 'Dot com' means it's American". Without bothering to explain him the intricacies of internet domains, I just handed him a printout of the page where they state at budget.com that the PROMISED RATE IS WHAT YOU PAY. He shrugged and said "We have our rates, and that's what you're going to pay! It's 255 euros.". I called Budget (the US number). They eventually instructed me to go ahead and pay what he asks and to call them after I return the car and discuss the refund. I called after I had returned the car, gave them the case file number that had already been set up, and I was told that it was forwarded to the international department and that I would receive a phone call in 2 weeks. I'm a bit disappointed as I was hoping this would be handled a more elegantly, but I guess all I can do now is wait. Paying $355 for a Friday night to Monday morning rental is RIDICULOUS and I am not giving up on this.

Another thing I should mention is the unscrupulous insurance policy they had. When you rent a car from Budget in Romania (and that schmuck insisted it was different than other Budget's) they take a deposit in the form of a hold on a credit card. They put a 500 euro ($675!!) hold on my CC. In case of ANY accident (regardless of who is at fault or other circumstances) they keep that money. So if you happen to leave the car parked and someone crashes into it (or even scratches it), you're out 675 smackers. I find that ridiculous! It's a ripoff.