You're stuck on the side of the road (or worse still in the third lane of the motorway). Happened to me (side of the road not motorway) 4 hour wait until a replacement tyre - at around £200 - was fitted, would have added callout charges if I had not belonged to a motoring association.

When we bought my wife's car - a Fiesta which is a common rental car - it had a inflator kit instead of a spare wheel. We insisted on a spare wheel - they tried to charge a £95 'option' fee, we threatened to walk away and they threw it for nothing.

I prefer to have a full size spare wheel, I think also that you are more likely to get a full size spare wheel if you have steel not alloy wheels. I suppose if you have a blow out like any other catastrophic breakdown they assume you get breakdown recovery which I believe is compulsory in Spain? In fact last year I helped a friend who had a puncture in both wheels one had ripped tyre off the rim as she drove about 1 1/2 miles on flat front wheel (note I said she no inference of course lol). I changed front with Spare and blew rear up sufficient to get off motorway to garage. I was told I should not have done either as you should leave it and get recovered off motorway in Spain even for a flat tyre, had the police passed by seemingly I would have been fined???

I guess you imply that it's the cost of the alloy wheels which decides whether you get one or not but it is more likely the weight because this effects the emissions and EU regs and taxes put very strict rules on emissions. And in any case if you have a spare get-you-home wheel its a steel one even if the originals are alloy.

I am not implying anything just my experience, you may well have a fact re weight. I know years ago I had an Opel Manta with alloys and the spare was alloy as well. More recently I have found when I have had a car with alloy wheels the spare tends to be steel get you home type. However all the cars I have owned including my current 2010 Peugeot that have steel wheels have a full size spare.

Do you mean Run Flats, the way they are constructed I do not think that they cant blow out, not without warning you first.

Ive had a few punctures in my run flats, I drove from UK to Spain with a puncture and kept re airing it and driving at quite high speeds, I think I still aired it for about a month after until I had it repaired, it just got worse by the day, when it just one day would not pump up, bit silly really as they only charged me 10 Euro to repair it. That's just my experience.

I had two punctures last year and was charged 10 euros each time which I thought was really cheap.

Rosemary

Well,back on subject ...... The gold car hire, which was a bit of a nail, broke down. On opening the bonnet it was pretty clear that not much was done in the way of care. I called the assistance number and they arrived in an hour with a truck. They had to take me to gold car in valencia where i was given a new car with 1000 kms on the clock. The broken down car had a split water hose, causing it to over heat.

I suppose i have to ask what i should expect for such a low rental. Hire ismuch cheaper through doyouspain than gold car direct, by a significant amount. I suppose the cynic would say that doyouspain bookings get the old well used cars because of low prices, but on this occasion it must have cost them a lot more than what i paid them to right the problem

Difficult to say but I have to comment because everytime I been to a Goldcar Desk I email them after the booking and try a bit of charm and always works, they flick around the keys in the tub and give me the best motor, but only cos I ask and I ask twice.

Sounds like you was just unlucky for me, but I never had one of there premium cars.............yet.

I only ever booked Goldcar direct or asked them to match the price, you cant do all that though same day, they are a bit slow to reply to emails but if you push they will and twice I left something in the car, once a driving licence and once a mobile and both times I got them back.

I don't think you will ever get better than a 7 day deal with them - so best to just return car book another and then explain you want to extend. Its my view

I always use trawler sites to get a good deal including doyouspain at times. I did find when using them and being allocated Record you tended to get higher milage and often battered looking cars unlike the nice cars those that went direct got. I was once or twice allocated Goldcar and that was not the case with them or others.

I've. Just used sixt at Alicante airport for a four day hire because I didn't want to have full tank charged. When I checked my credit card statement they have charged me 31euros for second driver without any warning.
Will not be using them again !

I have just received my credit card statement showing Firefly's debit.
I specifically asked for and received my bill at the time in Euros.
My credit card statement for the hire is in pounds. I can only assume that Firefly have made the conversion from euros to pounds prior to claiming from my credit card Co. benefiting from giving me a poorer exchange rate. I cannot check as I have thrown the bill away and it's not a significant amount as it was only a few days hire.
I do think this is underhand and probably shall not use them ago unless I prepay through the broker I buy from.
Has anyone else experienced this with Firefly? If not be warned.

If you use a UK credit card in Spain then you get a choices as to £ or € when you are putting it into the machine. I can only assume that Firefly made that choice for you without letting you know!

I fell for that once but the bill was in pounds so I should have checked. Restaurants often try the same trick. This time the bill was in euros. Perhaps I didn't check what was put in the machine, I cannot really remember but would be surprised as I was adamant that the bill be in euros. Mind you after queuing to get the car all I wanted to do was get going. Lesson learned, double check in future.