Europcar Schweiz Reviews 

The staff here are very rude. It’s not only behaviour I do not expect for any kind of customer service. It’s also so different to my experience of Swiss people. They were especially rude and especially unpleasant.

Dear Europcar Management Team,

I am writing to share my highly positive experience with your team in Switzerland and to express my sincere gratitude to two of your employees who provided exceptional customer service.On the morning of June 15, I picked up a rental car at the Zurich Airport (ZRH) station. I was assisted by Darius, who was incredibly helpful. He quickly found the car for me, explained everything in great detail, and provided very useful advice for my trip. His welcoming and professional attitude set a great tone for my journey.On the evening of June 16, I returned the car to the Chur station, where I was assisted by Kevin.

He was top-notch as well. Kevin gave me very clear instructions on how to return the vehicle, checked everything carefully and efficiently, and demonstrated outstanding professionalism throughout the entire process.Both Darius and Kevin are a true credit to Europcar. Such high professionalism, efficiency, and customer care deserve recognition from upper management. I kindly request that their direct supervisors see this feedback and reward them for their excellent work.Thank you for the fantastic service. I will certainly choose Europcar again for my future travels in Switzerland.

One of the worst and most humiliating customer service experiences I have ever had anywhere in Europe. Absolutely disgraceful treatment at Europcar Zurich Airport.

The employee one of them named Paul knows their exact names! Sarfis and another blonde-haired male employee at the Zurich Airport desk were incredibly rude, arrogant, dismissive, and unprofessional throughout the entire interaction. Their behavior made me feel racially profiled and deliberately targeted from the moment they saw my Asian passport.

I arrived with:
- A FULLY prepaid reservation
- Valid Norwegian driving license
- Multiple physical credit cards
- Fully paid hotel bookings
- All required travel documents

Despite everything being perfectly valid, they repeatedly treated me like I was doing something suspicious. My Norwegian license was checked around SEVEN TIMES. Every single time their own machine approved it and showed green, yet they continued questioning me again and again as if they were desperately trying to find a reason to reject me.

Then came more unnecessary demands:
- Hotel booking proof
- Return flight details
- Multiple passport inspections
- Repeated questioning

Even after showing fully paid luxury hotel bookings that cost more than the actual car rental itself, they still continued this interrogation-style treatment.

What made this even more obvious was watching local customers being processed normally within minutes while I was singled out and excessively scrutinized. Older local licenses were accepted immediately without any of this nonsense.

The attitude from Paul Sarfis and the blonde-haired colleague was honestly disgusting zero professionalism, zero respect, and absolutely no customer service skills. Instead of treating a paying customer properly, they made the entire process feel hostile, degrading, and humiliating.

If your own system approves a valid European-issued license multiple times, what exactly is the issue? The only obvious difference was my passport nationality and appearance.

To make things even worse, they CANCELLED my fully paid booking after wasting nearly an entire hour of my time. I was then forced to leave Europcar and make a completely new booking at Sixt from scratch after this ridiculous experience.

Thankfully, Sixt treated me professionally and respectfully within minutes no harassment, no endless interrogation, no profiling. And in the end I got a Mercedes CLE53 AMG, which was FAR better than the basic CLE Europcar was offering anyway.

I have rented luxury and premium cars in multiple countries around the world and have NEVER experienced this level of profiling, suspicion, and disrespect before.

Europcar Zurich Airport seriously needs anti-discrimination training and a complete review of the behavior of these employees. Based on my experience, I would strongly warn international travelers especially Asians and Middle Easterners to avoid this branch completely unless you want to be treated like a suspect instead of a customer.

On March 23, 2026, I rented a car from Unirent, a car rental company supported by Europcar.ch, at Basel Airport in Switzerland, with reservation number 792295738. I picked up the car on the same date. We traveled with the car for 4 days. I returned the car without any problems on March 27, 2026.
Approximately a month later, I received two traffic violation notices for exceeding the speed limit during my travels. I paid these at the police stations as instructed. However, when I later checked my credit card statement, I noticed that 42 Swiss Francs (CH) had been charged to my credit card separately for each traffic violation. Despite my objections to the company on different occasions, they said this money was for administrative expenses and did not refund me. I ended up paying a total of 4 times for two traffic violations. I did not like this practice. I do not recommend this company.

I made a reservation 6 months in advance for a 4x4 SUV (VW Tiguan or similar) to be picked up at Zurich Airport from March 12 to March 21, 2026.

At the time of booking, the vehicle category clearly stated it could accommodate 3 suitcases, which was essential for our trip.

However, upon arrival at the counter, the staff offered only two options:

A smaller vehicle that could not fit our luggage, despite matching our reservation category
A larger vehicle that could fit the luggage, but only if I paid an upgrade fee equal to ~75% of my original reservation cost

This put me in an unacceptable situation. Since neither option matched what I had booked and paid for, I was effectively forced into taking a lower-class station wagon, which:

Was not a 4x4 as reserved
Was clearly a cheaper category than what I paid for
Created stressful driving conditions, especially in snowy areas where a 4x4 would have been appropriate

This experience reflects very poorly on Europcar Mobility Group:

Reservations are not honored as booked
Customers are pressured at the counter to pay significantly more
Staff showed little willingness to resolve the issue fairly

Overall, this felt like a bait-and-switch situation, and it caused unnecessary stress during our trip.

I would strongly advise future customers to be cautious when booking with Europcar, especially if your vehicle requirements are important.

If I could put negative stars I would.
This concerns only moving vehicles: I can't say anything about normal vehicles.
Used to rent regularly moving vehicles from Europcar and was usually quite happy: pricing, availability and service was good in the Bern/Thun/Fribourg locations. All has changed: most people move on Saturday but the new policy is you can only either rent a half day (until noon) on Saturday or you have to pay to Monday although you're only using/needing the vehicle one day (let's not forget that we can't move on Sunday in Switzerland!). Yes, you can deposit the vehicle and keys in the box on Saturday but you still have to pay until Monday!
The excuse is that since their office is closed they can only process the return on the Monday which justifies an extra day of charges...I've returned enough vehicles to know that the process lasts about 15 min max ... paying an extra 150 francs for 15 min is ridiculous.
Availability has also gone way down...
Friendliness of the employees is equally non existent - clearly the employees have to deal with the backlash of poor management decisions.
I guess the people making decisions about moving vehicles not being available for full days on Saturday probably have a pay level which allows them to use professional movers and have no concept of a self- move!
Thankfully there are smaller firms which are fair and offer very friendly service for much better prices and better vehicles.

I paid a substantial amount for full insurance with zero excess specifically to avoid any additional charges. Despite this, I was later asked to pay a €100 “admin fee” for minor and questionable damage.

If “zero excess” still permits extra charges, that should be clearly and explicitly disclosed before customers purchase the most expensive coverage. Otherwise, the product does not operate as most people reasonably understand it.

In my experience with other rental companies, full coverage means no further payment. Customers should be aware that, at Europcar, this may not be the case.

At pick-up, our rental agreement arranged via Car Rental 8.com was declared invalid, and we had to arrange a completely new booking at significant extra cost.

Upon return, the vehicle inspection was far more intense than anything we’ve seen before, inside, outside, with a torch. A heavily disputed mark on the bumper turned out to be mud and was easily wiped off, but another mark was declared “new,” even though our pick-up video clearly showed it was already there. We were told we would need to send the evidence to head office for them to decide.

When we tried to take a video to provide evidence for head office, the staff members claimed we were violating GDPR and said he was calling the police, insisting it was not allowed to film personnel. We explained multiple times that we were only recording the car to provide proof for head office.

Eventually, their manager arrived and confirmed the mark was too minor to matter and no charges would be made. While this was helpful, there was no acknowledgment of the stress and confusion caused by the initial interaction.

Throughout, the staff members continued helping other customers, leaving us waiting and anxious about extra costs, police involvement, and catching our flight.

While we’ve had good experiences with other Europcar locations, we cannot recommend this branch.

We had to cut our rental short from 6 days to 3 days because of illness. Europcar refused any refund claiming that pre-paid bookings were non-refundable. It doesn't state this anywhere in either my booking info or their general T&Cs. This is just a big impersonal company ripping off the small people because they don't care.

Hired a "small" car for 5 days from Zurich airport (via Swissair).
Collected at 22.00, small queue which went quickly, friendly and helpful young man got us the keys in 15 minutes, no high pressure sales for insurance etc. and even got an upgrade.

No need for photos as they are automatically taken existing and returning to the airport.

Return was seamless. Very rare thing but they get a 10/10 from me

Avoid at all costs.
Complete nightmare.
First they gave me a car with a broken tire.
The day after I go to Zurich airport to change and they tell me I can only get a small economy car instead of a Premium that I booked. (Apparently there was no Premium electric and they were not allowed to give me a Premium gasoline). But they promise that 2 days later I can come back and they reserve another for me.
I do so. With a broken back after 1000km in that economy car, I went back to the airport. Next excuse now, I am too late and there is no one to check the returned car although there are two people at the desk and the car is only 50 meters away. And anyway, they tell me, the promised Premium car is not available.
Are you kidding me???

2 hour queue on a Sunday afternoon to collect the pre paid car !!

Check in had long ques but they did move in 30 mins but then the keys were not there and the car we ordered was also not right. The one they gave us was smaller in the boot and then I was offered to pay a further 150 CHF to upgrade, despite them not having the car I actually ordered. People were really disappointed and dissatisfied and the staff in the car park pick up area clearly didn’t care at all. I understand it is busy but kindness isn’t that hard especially to clients who have genuinely paid for a service they have not received.

Worst ever. 1 hour waiting in line to pick up a car. No customer service or speed. Just bad service and long waiting never again.

Mir wurden für zwei Mietwagen insgesamt 700 CHF Depot sowie 95 CHF Rückerstattung seit über sechs Wochen nicht zurückgezahlt. Mehrere Mahnungen per Mail und Telefon wurden ignoriert, stattdessen nur leere Versprechungen.

Ich werde die Forderungen nun rechtlich beitreiben und Staatsanwaltschaft sowie SECO einschalten. Europcar zeigt keinerlei Bereitschaft, Probleme aussergerichtlich zu lösen.

Klare Warnung: Finger weg von Europcar, wenn Sie Ihr Geld wiedersehen wollen.

I rented two cars within six weeks and was charged a total deposit of 700 CHF plus an additional 95 CHF that should have been refunded. After more than six weeks, none of this money has been returned.

Multiple written reminders and phone calls were ignored – only empty promises, no action. Europcar shows no willingness to settle the matter out of court.

I will now pursue my claims legally and involve the Public Prosecutor’s Office as well as SECO.

Clear warning: stay away from Europcar if you ever want to see your money again.

An example of the worst rental service you can experience. From the moment you visit the desk they are doing everything they can to force you to pay for a more expensive vehicle and take out their exorbitant insurances.

My car was parked next to a tree and upon returning the only undamaged panel had been clearly targeted. The person doing the inspection was able to find that immediately without referring to notes (despite nearly every panel being damaged). Luckily I have my own insurance and I am dealing with them but Europcar Geneva are a complete disgrace to deal with.

I booked a car with Europcar through Expedia in January of 2025. The car rental was for the last week in June 2026. The rental agreement could not have been clearer. I was to pay $428.28 USD for the week when I picked up the car. There was no reference to payment in Swiss Francs. When I picked up the car in June, Europcar charged me 379 CHF (I now suspect the equivalent value of $428.12 of Swiss Francs in January 2025). That sum (379 CHF) converted to $479.93 because of the devalued dollar. Now, I can well understand having to pay in Swiss Francs if my contract called for payment in Swiss Francs, and I would have done so without a thought. But my contract was in US Dollars only; there was never a reference anywhere in the contract to Swiss Francs; and I never agreed to pay Swiss Francs. Both Europcar and I agreed in a binding contract for payment in USD of $428.12. Long story short, I was taken for $50 dollars. This is a relatively small amount, but it is the principal of the matter, and this speaks volumes about the character of this company. I expected Europcar to be something much more than an extremely small and petty enterprise. Very disappointed!

We rented the Volvo XC60 with registration plate AI50078 on Wednesday 12/2/25 in Geneva airport for a total of 5 days until Sunday 16/2/25 evening for a total cost of 1080 CHF.
We barely used the car only to arrive to our destination which was Courchevel and on Saturday evening 15/2/25 we had a flat tire at 19:30. We alerted the road assistance and after 2,5 hours - and several calls – we received a message informing us there was no available technician in our area and we should call the policy for assistance!!!! what would have happened if we were in the middle of the highway and with small kids?
The assistance on Sunday 16/2/25 informed us again that they could not find someone on the Sunday to help us and even if hey did they would only collect the car and not fix it and advised us to take a taxi and return to Geneva and return the keys to Europe car. Unacceptable! On top the assistants in the Europecar in the Geneva airport were not helpful and were being ironic as well!

These people are unhelpful and unsympathetic. Waiting over an hour to get through customs then having to deal with these people. AVOID AT ALL COSTS

Move with the times guys. Wouldn’t accept Apple Pay for deposits so was refused the car despite already paying. No refund offered. Can’t believe they can get away with it.