Earlier this year I rented a car for a day from an office of easyCar in the London suburbs. I was very happy with the experience - the rental price was very low including 100% LDW insurance. Although the one-day rental only included 75 free miles, the low daily rate more than offset this.

Recently I visited the easyCar website again and noiced some very disappointing policy changes have been made by easyCar.

First of all, every rental incurs a �50 security deposit that it charged at the time the car is picked up. In order to get the �50 back, it is the responsibility of the renter to submit a "Deposit Reclaim Form" to easyCar within 3 days. If no excess fees are payable, easyCar will return your deposit 30 days after the rental ends.

The second nasty surprise is that excess mileage must be prepaid, either at the time the car is picked up, or before turning the car back in (you can do this online or by calling the 60p/minute booking number). Excess mileage bought and not used is not refunded. And failure to prepay your excess mileage will result in forfeiture of the �50 deposit.

They now charge a �10 cleaning fee upfront and refund it if the car is returned clean, but IMO this charge is worth it, given that I had to search for a local car wash and then pay �8 for them to wash the car...

easyCar says they have had to put these changes in place to counteract contingent liabilities such as unpaid parking tickets, congestion charges and other traffic violations. But giving them a free �50 float for a month for each rental seems to me to attack the very renter that I thought they were targeting - the urban dweller who doesn't need a car except for a few hours a few times per month. This type of renter could easily have a couple hundred pounds in deposits awaiting refund from easyCar with this policy.

I'm not sure I'd be so willing to recommend easyCar as I previously had...