8:46 am, December 2, 2025
Zipcar is to pull out of the UK at the end of the year after the car-sharing model failed to catch the imagination of British drivers.
The US firm has racked up millions of pounds of losses on this side of the Atlantic in the last year alone, and plans are now in place to shut down UK operations for good.
The outfit, which is owned by car rental heavyweight Avis Budget, told customers yesterday (Dec 1) that it is planning to suspend new bookings after December 31.
Bosses have now entered into a formal consultation with the firm’s 71 employees ahead of operations ending over the coming weeks.
James Taylor, general manager of Zipcar UK, told customers: ‘I am writing to let you know that we are proposing to cease the UK operations of Zipcar and have today started formal consultation with our UK employees.
‘We will temporarily suspend bookings, pending the outcome of this consultation.
‘This means it will not be possible to make any new bookings beyond December 31 2025, pending the outcome of the consultation.’
He added that customer accounts will remain until the company has confirmed its decision at the end of the consultation process.
Accounts showed that the van and car hire firm saw losses deepen to £5.7m in 2024 after a decrease in customer trips.
Zipcar currently has around 650,000 members in the UK, all of whom can rent cars by the hour or for a day, using the company’s app.
The firm is the UK’s biggest car-sharing platform but last year ended operations in Oxford, Cambridge and Bristol in order to focus on London.
