ALAMO CAR RENTAL REVIEWS IN PORTUGAL

I want to start by saying that this was the worse car rental experience of my life. I rented a minivan. It took over 3 hours of waiting in line before I could get the car. And, it was all downhill from there. On the second day, after our day trip, we were headed to Castro Marim. However, right when we were ready to leave, the minivan started showing me a "service required" light. I had to drive all the way to the airport to swap out the car for another minivan. Our trip to Castro Marim was delayed by 2+ hours and we didn't get there until past midnight. But that's not all of it, the 2nd minivan we got was even worse. About an hour into our drive, it started showing me all sorts of warning lights on the dashboard, including, "Brake System Failure", "Stop", and more. The lights in the entire car were flashing every few mins. It was really scary and traumatizing for everyone in the car. We pulled over multiple times and restarted the car (as instructed), which resolved the issue each time. However, when we got to our rental house, the car died right at the gate blocking other cars from getting into the property. We had to drag all of our luggage through a long path in the middle of the night. The next morning I got in touch with customer service, who arranged for a tow truck to pick up the car and a taxi to pick me up and drive me to Faro airport to pick up yet another minivan. This 3rd car had a broken sunroof shade and made our drive very uncomfortable. I chose to pay a premium on a car rental to ensure we would avoid these types of issues. However, that was not the case. I was in Portugal for 5 days with my family and lost about a day and a half because of all these issues with the cars. Again, this was the worse car rental experience of my life. I am considering posting reviews with my experience on the 3rd party sites. Contacted Alamo/Guerin multiple times but they have not gotten back to me.

Satisfied

The rental company aggressively promoted insurance, and their service attitude was very poor if you didn't purchase it. I calculated the insurance cost from the rental company, and it turned out to be similar to what was offered by the third-party platform. It’s better to buy directly from the rental company in the future because you don’t even have to pay a deposit after purchasing it. I initially rented a Toyota hybrid to save on fuel costs, but they gave me an old Spanish-made car instead, claiming it was the same class.

The pickup and drop-off process was very quick! The staff was also very friendly! Highly recommended!

The car is pretty good and picking it up is convenient.

The actual rental company is Guerin.

new car, clean.

At the counter desk, i had to fill in all the required information, but they know this already because we gave it with the reservation. We forced to use the tablet and a service team was standing over there doing notting. I had appreciated they did the fill in or better reuse the information from the reservation. Took us 30min extra.

Please please please check the tire pressure. This is the third time that it shows low tire pressure. I spent another 30+ at the repair fácil getting them to figure out how to fix the tire pressure. Everything else was great!

Good job!

The set-up assistant missed informing us of the fuel shortage and strikes at the petrol station in Faro. So in the week when we ran out and kept finding closed stations, we spoke with CS and eventually got to Julie after 24 hours of to and fro. She pulled out all the stops to make sure we were fuelled and ok to go and kept in touch till we were happy all was okk

We had to wait 4 hours to pick up the vehicle. Very slow process. When i picked up the vehicle light on dash to add Blue. I brought this to attendant attention i was told i would to wait at least before they address it. It cost me 22.50 euros to fill up.

Very satisfied!

The lady at the counter proposed any upgrade saying it would be a diesel car so more economic. But at the pickup it was not a diesel car. Very desapointing to pay for that.

Good provider

Greate booking platform!

Extremely dissatisfied. Out of the 20 countries where I have self-driven abroad, this was the worst experience. On the second day of the rental, I lost the car key due to my own mistake. A local friend in Portugal tried to help me pick up a spare key from the airport, but I was told I had to go in person. So I took a taxi to the rental location at the airport, only to be told there was no spare key. I was then instructed to personally call the towing company and return to the car's location myself. I took another taxi back to the car and waited for hours. When the tow truck arrived, the towing company said the car must be taken to a repair shop, not the rental office. Additionally, I had to bear all the resulting fees (towing, key replacement, refueling, labor, road service, etc.) myself, as the insurance did not cover them. This was my worst car rental experience ever! Remember the name Alamo. Never rent from this company.

Unlike my experiences in Spain or previous rentals, at the Porto ALAMO branch, it's self-service for the rental process. It was my first time doing it! I had to figure out how to fill out the forms myself and asked the staff for help when I didn't understand something. After about half an hour of effort, I finally completed the rental process.

Unlike my previous rental experiences in Spain or elsewhere, at the ALAMO store in Porto, the rental process was self-service. This was the first time for me! It took half an hour of fumbling with the forms and asking staff for help to finally complete the rental process.

The automated booking kiosk was not 100% operational.

all went smoothly

Great deals!

Everything was ok

Great, the service is warm and patient, and there's a self-service machine.