SUV drivers are a strange lot. A man dressed in drag recently dropped his damaged 4x4 back to a rental company claiming he "wasn't used to wearing high heels".
It was one of many bizarre excuses recorded by National Car Rental in Britain in a survey carried out over the past year across 145 branches. "We were attacked by monkeys," claimed another customer who damaged a hire car after driving through an animal enclosure.
A driver in Edinburgh "hit a square round-about" damaging a vehicle, while a customer in London engaged in a little destructive fun, telling the rental company: "I thought I could damage the car as I had paid £500 deposit."
The survey found men and women both guilty of providing bogus excuses which fall into the same category as "the dog ate my homework". A woman in Birmingham said it was "the rock's fault - it got in the way" after she backed into a rock in a field.
Those who left their cars back to the company late also provided some interesting excuses. "I thought Scotland was on a different time zone," said one, while another lost the car altogether, having forgotten where he parked it.
An Australian customer who was late returning a car said a defective heater made his shoes melt. "I couldn't drive properly after that," he said.
Among the items left behind in some of the National Car Rental fleet were a ginger toupee, a tumble dryer, a package from Ann Summers, a rocking horse, a transplant organ box, a false leg and a wheelchair.
One item which was not left behind was a baby girl who was born in a rental car. Her proud parents called her Karen in recognition of the delivery suite. The question is would they have called her Larry if she was born in a Scania truck?
