Straw, $100,000 in cash, rabbit droppings, and even a baby: these are some of the strange things people have left behind in cars hired in the UK. One rental company even had to clean up the inside of a brand new Volkswagen Golf, which had been used to transport motor oil.
"You often hear people say, 'It's only a hire car,'" Bruce Howard, managing director of Sixt Kenning Car Rental, told the Financial Times. "Yet if they had spilt gravy on a rented jacket, they would be petrified of returning it dirty."
Geoff Corbett, managing director of the car-hire consultancy Abrams Consulting International, says that one of the reasons why people have become less careful these days is that they are better insured than before. Now, rental firms are becoming stricter about checking cars when they are collected and returned. They are also increasing the amount that customers have to pay for damage to the car. As a result, more and more customers are protecting themselves by taking photos of their hire cars before and after collection.
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