Gill Charlton looks at who's at fault when a hire car breaks down; the cost of antimalarial tablets; and reminds air travellers to check bag restrictions on all airlines.

Gill Charlton advises on how to get to Monet's garden, by public transport Photo: Corbis

We are within easy reach of Stansted or can get to London for the Eurostar. Should we stay in Rouen, or is it easier to travel from Paris for the day?
Mrs Monica Foyle, Wymondham

Gill Charlton replies
I would take Eurostar to Paris. Giverny is near the main railway line connecting Paris to Rouen and Le Havre. Trains leave from St Lazare station and the journey to Vernon takes 45 minutes. From there it's a three-mile walk along an old railway line to Giverny, or there are taxis and buses. However, Vernon is a pretty place to spend the night.

Decent b & bs and chateaux homestays cost from about £40 a night for a double room through www.giverny.org The town is also within easy reach of Richard the Lionheart's Les Andelys castle. People who live along the south coast can reach Giverny by ferry from Portsmouth to Le Havre and stay in Rouen, which is 30 minutes by train from Vernon.

Debit card bookings

I have recently been charged £18 for using my bank debit card to buy three flights costing £167.70 in total. Are there any regulations regarding the maximum amount that can be charged for using a debit card to book flights?

These charges for using debit and credit cards are simply a way for airlines to hide the true cost of buying a flight ticket until you have reached the final "buy" page.

Airlines have discovered that once customers have reached this stage they are usually committed to making a purchase, so adding "fees" for using cards does not deter them from completing the transaction.

There is no legal maximum charge; airlines can simply keep increasing charges until they spot consumer resistance. The cost of processing a debit-card transaction is about 28p, so there's plenty of profit in it.

Credit-card transactions are more costly; the charge depends on the airline's relationship with its card services provider, but it is unlikely to be more than 1.5 per cent of the cost of the flights.

Hire car charges at Faro Airport

I rented a Ford Focus estate in the Algarve in April. It had 731km on the clock on pickup. We drove a further 200km before I lost drive as I pulled out of a junction.

We had reserved the vehicle through Travel Jigsaw's website and collected it from the Guerin rental desk at Faro airport. Guerin replaced the car but insisted that the failed clutch was my fault. I was forced to complete an accident form – in Portuguese – where I disputed that the damage had been caused by my driving.

Guerin has now deducted €600 from my credit card. I have been in touch with Travel Jigsaw, which says it has tried to negotiate with Guerin on my behalf but without success.

Asking around, I discovered that a colleague of my sister-in-law had had a similar problem after renting a Ford Focus in Portugal. Is this some sort of scam?
Steve Armstrong, Louth

Gill Charlton replies
Faro features more often than any other airport in the letters I receive complaining about car rental agents. Usually, the issue is high charges for bumps and scratches that customers failed to notice when collecting cars.

In my view, rental agencies should not charge customers for worn-out clutches unless they can prove that the damage was caused through negligence or misuse by the most recent driver.

However, Guerin's maintenance director says that the replacement clutch could not be fitted under warranty because its failure was the fault of the driver.

But which driver? I asked the British clutch repair specialist Mr Clutch for a view on how this might have happened to an almost-new car. "It could just as easily have been an incorrectly aligned clutch or a badly fitted flywheel," a spokesman said. "You can't rule out driver misuse, but it would have to have been excessive."

I put it to Guerin, through Travel Jigsaw, that there could have been a faulty factory installation – especially as Mr Armstrong reported no symptoms, only a single loud metallic bang. Guerin refuses to budge.

Travel Jigsaw says that its contractual responsibility ceases once the customer signs the rental agreement with the local supplier. However, the company does accept the principle that the last driver may not be responsible for a burnt-out clutch and, in the spirit of exemplary customer service, it is repaying Mr Armstrong £538.40 out of its own funds.

Rising cost of Malarone

My husband and I, who are going to visit Botswana in October, have been told by the travel nurse at our GP surgery that we will have to pay £10 each for a private prescription for Malarone. Antimalarials are expensive enough; is it fair for doctors to make a profit, too?
Ann Walker, Long Eaton

Gill Charlton replies
The NHS will fund medication only for illnesses acquired in Britain, not in anticipation of illnesses that may be acquired abroad. The British Medical Association says that as the demand for antimalarials grew in the Nineties, new wording was added to GPs' terms and conditions. This says that antimalarials and other travel inoculations should be prescribed privately, and that doctors have the right to make a charge for issuing the necessary prescriptions.

Online pharmacies such as Boots and Dr Fox will issue private prescriptions for Malarone but hide a higher administration charge – about £20 – in the price of the tablets.

Baggage allowances

Earlier this year we bought British Airways tickets to Australia, flying into Sydney and returning from Perth via Singapore. The baggage allowance for World Traveller Plus is two bags, each weighing up to 23kg, per passenger. Our flight from Perth was operated by Qantas, which allows only one hold bag per passenger. Even though we were flying under a BA flight number, we had to pay an excess charge of £480.

BA has told us that each airline keeps it own identity and has dismissed our claim for a refund.
Angela and Michael Hobbs, Orpington

Gill Charlton replies
Unusually, you made the flight reservation through BA's call centre, and this information about baggage allowances isn't on the standard sales script. If you had booked the flights through BA's website you would have been prompted to click through to a statement that reads: "If you travel with British Airways and another airline during your journey, the British Airways baggage allowance may be more generous and you could be charged for extra baggage by the other airline."

This information should always be displayed online during the booking process, but it can be easily missed, especially when you are buying tickets through a flight broker.

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