A nightmare 10-hour wait by a busy road to be rescued by the RAC

theguardian.com:

Last September, our car broke down on the A12 in Essex on our way back from our son’s birthday treat. We managed to pull on to a lane about 20 metres from the main road.

We rang the RAC for assistance at 7.30pm and received a text stating a wait of four and a half hours. We rang regularly to explain that we had two distressed children and were eventually told that we were being prioritised. However, successive text updates kept stating that we should wait another 30 minutes for an update. By midnight, there was still no sign of help.

We rang again, and were told that 4:30am was the earliest we could expect assistance. We complained again and were offered a hotel, but the RAC explained we would have to return to the car at 4:30am, which meant no one would get any sleep.

Our children were now extremely distressed, but the RAC was adamant that we didn’t have taxi cover. Finally, it relented and ordered a taxi to take the children and myself the 80 miles home while my partner remained with the car.

We were informed that a “trusted partner” was on its way, but it didn’t show up. At 3.24am, my partner called the “trusted partner”. It claimed it had driven the length of the lane but not found the car, and that it had called us but not got through, so the callout had been cancelled. There were no missed calls (turned out they’d got the number wrong) and no truck had passed down the lane.

My partner called the RAC, which told him the recovery driver had simultaneously claimed it had not found the car, and that it had found it unattended.

Eventually, an RAC patrol arrived at 5am, nearly 10 hours after we’d broken down. RAC has since offered us £100 but refused to admit its errors or apologise.

CT, Rickmansworth

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