Hi all, I am travelling down at the end of June to look for a small place in the Dordogne and will be bringing my two dogs as I really cannot leave them in the UK. What would your suggestions be for breakdown cover for my journey? I have been with the AA before and was very dissappointed in the UK and France as they just took me to a terribly expensive garage and apart from the "rescue" i could have found a garage easier myself.
I also note that in the UK dogs are not really catered for in a breakdown situation, does anyone have any helpful experience of this in France?
Best Thoughts
Susan
Breakdown cover in France is nearly always included in the insurance policy so there's no real AA or RAC here. Best of a bad lot really :-(
I use AXA bought in the UK, a fractin of the price of AA/RAC etc. never broken down so can't comment on service only price. Others have mentioned ADAC (0049 89 76 76 66 32) German I believe but they had good reports. If it just a holiday and not annual the cover from Eurotunnel wasn't too bad price wise.
I have some experience in breaking down in the Pyrenees with a Dog on board. In my case their (Britannia Rescue) usual action is to fly you and your passengers back to the UK, and then about a month later your car arrives on your drive, all quite straightforward.
However with a Dog on board I was given a Taxi to the main town, a hire car to take me to Calais at which point I had to pay a local French Taxi to take us & Dog through the Tunnel plus the Tunnel fees which from memory (2013) was €250 + €150, then we were given a hire car from Dover etc. Eventually the car arrived about 4 weeks later.
If I had had more time I would have stayed and had the car repaired in France, but I was up against a timeline for when we had to back in the UK for a certain event. That said, the service provided did work fine, just a little expensive.
I suspect all UK companies use the same dedicated European Assist service for outside the UK, as I can't see any of them trying to work directly with 20 different countries and local garages, hence whoever you choose in the UK could result in the same 'Continental Response'.