Despite previous reports and denials, rental companies did know that the cars were passed on to Car Driver Deals customers. Hertz Benelux was also aware of this construction, but in times of crisis the company wanted to count its blessings earlier and had its cars retrieved. At that time, there were no further problems with Car Driver Deals and the cars were paid properly. Van den Helder has never personally observed that other rental companies did the same. After all, a wave of cars returned to all rental companies during the crisis last year. In those times, car rental companies were happy that there was a sales area after all. According to van den Helder, it was a very nice solution for a temporary problem that was present at the time. 

Bovag warning

During the broadcast of Studio Automotive on 6 July, the state of affairs regarding the company Car Driver Deals, which is in dire straits, was discussed. Henk van den Helder, director of Hertz Benelux and chairman of Bovag Car Rental Companies, was a guest to talk about the problems at CDD. Luberto van Buiten, editor-in-chief of Automotive, who follows the Car Driver Deals file on behalf of Automotive.

Bovag warned rental companies that Car Driver Deals rented large batches of cars and then re-rented them. Over time, however, payment was not forthcoming. The Limburg-based, nationally operating company has approached several lessors in recent months with various proposals, often because the company needed lead cars. As chairman of Bovag Car Rental Companies, van den Helder indicates that the impact of the warning that the Bovag members sent out about CDD's working methods was greater than expected. 

After all, they didn't know at the time that it was about such huge numbers. A number of carriers collected the cars from CDD after Bovag's warning came to light. Yet it was not a bolt from the blue because a number of companies already had payment problems with the Maasbracht company. Bovag does not feel responsible that their waarschuwing has accelerated everything.

“We need to have our finances safe and not take any further risks like we are already doing and we need to chart the way forward”

no risks

Henk van den Helder of Hertz Benelux indicates that at the end of 2019 25 cars were used for Car Driver Deals. The company had previously carried out all credit checks, according to which there appeared to be no problems at all. In March, Hertz Benelux was forced to look into its own portfolio. Everything had to do with the general problems within Hertz, such as a possible bankruptcy in America, which could possibly be linked to Europe. In addition, corona came on top of it so that they decided to return as many cars as possible to the suppliers. In the meantime, Hertz had also seen that Car Driver Deals passed on the cars rented from them to customers who could just as well rent a car directly from themselves. So just to be on the safe side, Hertz retrieved the cars.

Delissen and Martens

More than seven hundred victims have now joined Delissen and Martens, including the policyholders of Stichting Achmea Rechtsbijstand (ASR, Nationale Nederlanden, Interpolis), DAS, ARAG and Klaverblad. Lawyer Olivier van Hardenbroek informs the victims in a state of affairs that that number will increase even further. Atvangarde BV, the company in which the company of Car Driver Deals was placed, has not (yet) been declared bankrupt. Atvangarde is expected to be declared bankrupt in the coming weeks.

In the meantime, there would also be demonstrable fraud because new customers were still being acquired after payment deferrals were requested from the suppliers. And that is prohibited by law. Car Driver Deals' own cars are housed in Benefit Groep BV, a company with the same drivers as Atvangarde. Benefit Group's cars are at least partly financed externally. The finance companies have negotiated pledges on cars of the Benefit group as security for the repayment of the loans. 

It is not yet known whether the liens relate to all cars or to just some of the cars. It is also not yet known what the value is of the cars on which liens rest and how that value relates to the outstanding debts. On June 14, 2021, the finance companies received permission from the court to take possession of the cars on which a pledge was established. The legal term for this is that they may confiscate the cars.

Also read: Victimized CDD customers are left with questions

cars are recovered en masse
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