DAYS Contract Hire, a fleet management company with more than 7,000 vehicles on UK roads and one of the top 30 leasing companies by size, needs a website that users can easily get round to check its pedigree – and special offers.

Luckily, the user won’t have any problems navigating round the Days Contract Hire site – its no-frills layout shouldn’t prove difficult for even the least internet savvy customer.

The homepage has a rather tatty hit counter at the bottom and a ‘special offers’ button at the top of the site which links through to another minisite.

The minisite (which actually looks better than the homepage), includes details of all the special offers of the week, which are, conveniently, downloadable as pdfs. The minisite also offers a monthly newsletter to subscribe to, updating the customer on special offers each month.

A simple left-hand menu will guide you to different sections of the site, including an online brochure, book a service section and a tax calculator – which is a function incorporated into Fleet NewsNet. It’s also possible to request forms to allow you to take your hire car abroad.

All the services you need from a contract hire site are available in an online format. Requesting a purchasing price is also possible, as well as a feedback area of the site, which enables customers to rate the site and add any comments. Unfortunately the online brochure request section of the site wasn’t working – and although the site is easy to navigate, it wasn’t clear how I could obtain a password to log on.

The site also uses pop-ups for its online quotation log-on and enquiry forms, so users will have to switch off any blockers for using the site.

The site overall isn’t too pretty to look at, but it doesn’t need to be, it provides all the information necessary to scope out the deals and information on contract hire cars. Jeremy Bennett

The lowdown

The site: www.dayscontracthire.co.uk

We like

Has gone beyond the norm in its layout

We don’t like

The nasty ‘hit’ counter on the homepage