SOUNDING OFF: Ripped off? Stunned by good service? Write, blog or text your experience to us

Further evidence of how Irish customers are being fleeced comes from another reader's experience of renting a car at Holyhead. "Despite their advertised sales prices (which never seem to meet their promises), fares for ferries between Ireland and Britain are ridiculously high (compare them to the fares between Britain and France or Holland), and for a short trip (or even a longer trip) it makes no sense to take the car," she writes. "So we went as foot passengers and rented a car."

The only rental company with an office in Holyhead terminal is Hertz, she says, "but beware of booking through Hertz's Irish site - I was quoted a staggering €278 on www.hertz.ie, while for the exact same rental of their basic economy car, for the same period of five days, with the same pick-up and drop-off points, the Hertz.co.uk site quoted £118, which worked out at about €149." She also alerts readers to the fact that, booking the Stenaline Dun Laoghaire-Holyhead ferry on the UK site also cost less than booking the same trip on the Irish site, whether as a car or foot passenger.

"Our planned travel dates changed a few times before we booked, and the prices changed - but also showed an anomaly in the prices between a four- or five-day rental. The price quoted for five days was about £60 (€75) more than for four days, which is a barmy rate for a single additional day's rental. Hertz has no phone number that I could find on their site, but through web searches I found a number to ring to query the pricing structure, and was sent from Billy to Jack and spoke to a series of people in the UK."

Eventually, she was told that Hertz rates were for either four or seven days and even though she booked the car for five days she was being charged for a full week. "He suggested that if I booked the car for four days but kept it for five days, I should be charged a quarter of the four-day rate for the fifth day (which would make sense). He refused to give his name, however, as he could not stand over it, and was not a reservation clerk." Wisely perhaps, our reader decided to take her business elsewhere and booked with a company in a village about six miles from Holyhead "who were unhelpful, inefficient and supplied a lousy, old, tiny car whose alarm went off most times we put the key in the door. The rate was a flat £22 (€27) a day, plus taxi fares of £7 (€8.70) each way. It seems you can't win."

Costly car park

A reader was in St Vincent's Hospital recently visiting a sick relative when he uncovered a practice which he considered very unfair. He drove through the barriers in the car park at exactly 8.03pm, stayed for an hour and left at exactly 9.04pm.

And the price? €4.70 with the 60 seconds over the first hour costing him €2.35. "I think people should be given a few minutes' grace at the very least," he writes. "I can't understand why hospital car parks do business like this. It really is unfair to expect people to be watching the clock when they are visiting sick people."

Humane Ryanair

A reader from Co Tipperary thought he should bring our attention to his recent dealings with Ryanair. "I suffered a bereavement in my family recently," he writes, "and was unable to use my flight booked with Ryanair. When I subsequently sought to make a claim on my multi-trip travel insurance, I needed to get a 'no show' letter from the airline. On contacting Ryanair and supplying the details, I received a letter of condolence and a full refund of the airfare. Is this the human face of Ryanair that Michael O'Leary tries to hide?"