Car rental role-play

Car rental desks with employees, one of the roles in this role play.

A car rental role-play is a role-play set in a car rental office.

The usual roles here would be a traveller and a customer service worker.

Renting a car is an authentic task, as travellers may have to rent a car and use English to do so. However, it’s not an everyday occurrence, and you may need to brainstorm ideas on how to do the role-play before actually doing it.

Typical aspects include:

• Checking whether the customer has a reservation. (Note that if the customer doesn’t the price is likely to be a lot higher than if they had reserved online!)
• Checking what sort of car the customer wants. Although the industry uses a complex coding system, most rental cars fall into basic categories of being a cheaper small-sized "economy" car, a mid-priced, mid-sized "family" car, or an expensive larger "luxury" car.
• Checking how long the customer wants the car for.
• Checking the customer’s details, e.g. driving licence, passport.
• Paying for the car, which may include a deposit.

Possible complications include:

• The customer wants to pick the car up at one location (e.g. an airport) but drop it off at another (e.g. another airport).
• Does the customer want extra insurance?
• There is a problem with the reservation
• The customer wants to change the reservation somehow
• The car the customer reserved is not available (maybe a similar one is).
• What the customer should do if there is a problem (e.g. the car breaks down).

Authentic materials, carefully chosen, could enhance this role-play.