Two very fraught days

I hired a van from Leclerc in Trelissac to drive to Nantes on Friday (20th October) to pick up the two wardrobe and storage units for bedrooms one and two. The vehicle was the smallest they have for hire, a Ford Transit of 8m3 capacity and knowing the length of the items I was picking up I was concerned that it might be a bit too short and that perhaps I might change my order for a larger vehicle. However, there wasn’t one at either of the two local Leclerc depots so I decided to take the chance. Little did I know that this would be the least of my worries.

The total distance there and back was a bit over 800 kms and the little van proved to be more than up to the job although the first problem I encountered was the weather. It was cloudy and already raining by the time I left Périgueux at around 9.15am and things went from bad to worse as the journey progressed. Rain with high wind gusts had been forecast and this proved to be an understatement with the conditions on the main roads being a nightmare with the amount of spray being thrown up from the wheels of trucks making passing them a distinctly less than comfortable experience.

However, I arrived at Ikea in Nantes at around 2.20pm and was thus able to meet my intended pick-up schedule. The shopping centre that Ikea is located in is huge and impressive with an enormous car park at ground level under the centre’s main structure and on entering the latter you have to ascend moving ramps to get to Ikea on the first floor. They refer to it as levels 1 and -1. Here’s a shot I took of the foyer with the ramps leading up to Ikea.

On entering Ikea I had no idea where I was supposed to go but there was a small arrivals desk just inside where I entered the store and the lady standing there very kindly took me to where I could pick up my purchases. The young chap there said everything except one item was available and for that I’d have to go to another Ikea depot, the address of which he gave me. Luckily Waze, the satnav on my mobile phone, recognised it immediately as it had the address of the main Ikea store which I was then in.

I was staggered when the young guy wheeled out my purchases. Because of their lengths the ten mirror doors were laid across two large trollies and the remaining items the same on two more. I said I’d need help to load them onto my van and another young colleague kindly agreed to do so. We had to take two lifts to descend to the car park because of the widths of the loaded trollies and when we got down there he suggested that he would wait while I brought my van over and parked in the ‘mother and child’ bays close by to load it.

So off I went to find it, but easier said than done. I found the van some way away via a tortuous route and then had the task of trying to find my way back to the lifts where the young chap was waiting. I ended up driving around the car park several times before I finally noticed him waving at me in the distance. OK, I thought, but it still took me another couple of goes before I found the right aisles in the car park that took me back to where he stood.

With the volume and weight of several of the items it took the two of us to load the van. Luckily everything just fitted in for length but I was amazed by the shear volume involved. I was already then beginning to think about how I would be able to unload the van at the other end as it would be night time, I’d have no one to help me and I’d have to get it all off so I could return the van early the following morning. Here’s how the interior of the van looked after it had all been loaded, and don’t forget there was still one more item to come.

I had an horrendous drive home. It was fine but still blustery when I left Nantes in the late afternoon having picked up the final item at the other Ikea depot. It was the longest of all, too long to go directly in the van but fortunately it fitted in diagonally placed on top of all the other items. As I headed south and it became dark I drove back into the stormy weather again. The rain wasn’t as hard as in the morning but the spray from other vehicles was just as bad in places and was exacerbated by the headlights of oncoming vehicles.

It was a terrible driving experience but there was worse to come. I was in a stream of vehicles on the main road heading south in the Charente when a large wild boar sprang out of the woods on the right hand side of the road, right in front of my van. With all of the vehicles to choose from why did it have to choose mine? I slammed on the brakes which were remarkably effective given the state of the road and the weight I was carrying and the animal crossed in front of me over to the other carriageway.

There happened to be no oncoming traffic at the time but instead of continuing it stopped and turned back again, right in front of me. I could do nothing to avoid it but luckily I think I only gave it a hard tap. But anyway, when I got out to check there was no sign of it and there was no apparent damage to the front of the van, so I continued my journey home where I eventually had the job of unloading the van at around 10.30 pm in gusting wind and rain showers. I succeeded with difficulty in getting the items off that took two of us to load in Nantes and here’s how the main part of the load looked afterwards on the floor of my living room.

And here are the remaining small items that I put separately in bedroom one.

But my nightmare still wasn’t over. It continued when I returned the van to Leclerc. The first thing was that they said the van was ‘dirty’ and demanded a 50€ ‘cleaning’ surcharge. I said I’d never heard of such a thing before. Usually when a hire vehicle is returned it’s prepared for rehiring by the hire company. Now Leclerc expect you to do it for them apparently.

The vehicle only had normal road grime on it and I said that I’d take it away and clean it myself but that I wouldn’t pay any additional hiring fees while I was away. I ended up taking it to the car wash in the Leclerc facility and that cost me an additional charge of over 11€. Nearly half of that was wasted as you have to buy ‘jetons’ (tokens) to go in the machine and the minimum you end up paying for covers two washes at least. Not much use to me living in Fleurac.

But it wasn’t to end there, far from it. When I’d picked up the van I’d mentioned how many knocks and dings had been noted on its sheet, none of which had been fixed or repaired as all were minor or cosmetic. When they checked the van after I’d washed it I was called outside and told that there was a problem. It was a stone chip on the front bumper about the size of a little finger nail, acvtually a bit less, probably as a result of debris thrown up by another vehicle. It was nothing special and anyone would have just dabbed a spot of touch-up paint on it.

But not Leclerc. They made a huge issue of it and said that the vehicle would have to go off to the body shop to be assessed by their painter. In the meantime despite my protestations they have seized my 1500€ security deposit and I know what I now expect. A huge bill for repainting the van’s front bumper. They won’t do it, of course, it’ll just be marked on the sheet as another cosmetic blemish on the vehicle as far as future hirers are concerned.

I suspect Leclerc is making more out of ‘repairs’ on the van that I hired than from the actual hires themselves. You hear stories like this but usually about less reputable vehicle hire companies. But it would seem that Leclerc has now decided to go the same way. I’ve used them several times since I’ve been here without any problems but this will be the last time, that’s for sure.