Adventures in Car Rentals

[jamesdeluxe]

We've often discussed the many challenges of renting cars domestically and internationally; however, I couldn't find a dedicated thread, so here it is. Maybe I should aggregate previous interesting discussions here. To start off, here's a NYT article about something I've often wondered about:

The final paragraph of the article is hard to swallow because I view third-party car insurance as a racket in cases when your credit card explicitly tells you to decline additional coverage.

There is one tactic that could help prevent these types of headaches when renting a car abroad — counterintuitive as it may seem to most seasoned travelers: If it’s not too expensive, consider just buying the rental agency’s damage protection.​

What's to stop the rental agency's car insurance from throwing up roadblocks to foreigners who've returned home (similar to travel insurance -- "if you'd read the fine print in the contract, you would know that we require this and this and this") -- and the hapless tourist would likely just give up at a certain point and not contact the NY Times ombudsman. In that case, the customer is out the $1,300 damage fee AND the additional cost of third-party insurance!

 

[ChrisC]

I hate car rentals and insurance; luckily, I have not had to use credit card insurance more than once for a tire rim (?wtf?!)

Generally, if I rent in the winter or an outdoorsy area, I physically smear my car with mud, road melt, etc., to cover scratches and window dings. I return my rental cars with a lovely thin layer of dust, dirt, etc, that one cannot tell what is going on underneath.

 

[Tony Crocker]

I hate car rentals and insurance;

+1 I nearly always refuse it. I made exceptions for the 2024 eclipse in Mexico when I knew we were driving into the hinterlands, and also for South Africa/Lesotho.

I got into a protracted dispute in Spokane in 2014 when I made the error of admitting I was skiing in Canada and Budget/Thrifty refused to let me have the car without the add-on insurance. I later found out that my regular auto policy covered rentals in Canada, tried to dispute via AMEX and got nowhere. Lesson learned: Do not tell a U.S. airport car rental counter that you are driving into Canada!

 

[jamesdeluxe]

Do not tell a U.S. airport car rental counter that you are driving into Canada!

That makes sense but what happens if you drive into Canada and get into an accident without the add-on insurance? Even if it was covered by your auto policy or wasn't your fault, what are the repercussions when Budget/Thrifty learns that you crossed the border against the terms in the contract? Is there anything they can do other than blackball you from future rentals?

 

[Tony Crocker]

the terms in the contract

I'd be surprised if it's in the contract. I've done it several times and only this once was I fed this about the U.S.-Canada border crossing.

 

[Sbooker]

My ordeal at Christmas with our delayed flights was very stressful. I was looking down the barrel of a $6200USD rental car charge because I didn’t pick it up on time.

S

Post in thread 'Holiday Ski Plans, again!'

Dec 23, 2024

Just arrived in Mill Creek Utah.
I went to the desk and had my daughter with me. My wife and son and mother-in-law were not with us because they had to fly via Denver to get to SLC as there were not enough seats on our flight.
Anyway the unhelpful lady at rental desk almost delighted in telling me, after pleading our genuine case, that our reservation had been rented but she could provide a new one for $6200USD. (About 10 grand Aussie compared to the approx original price of $2000 Aussie). Knowing how stressed I had been in the last 24 hours Emily started crying fearing I would lose my...

• Sbooker

• 

 

[EMSC]

I've been mostly very lucky thus far in life with rentals (crosses fingers, etc..). But a couple of stories:

1) One time I booked through a 3rd party web site (back in early 2000's) arrived at the airport with a printed out copy of my reservation. They refused to honor it and said it wasn't even in their system. But they would gladly rent me a car for triple the price I thought I had reserved for. I was so pissed off that I went to the other rental counters and found one that was 'only' about 50% more than was printed on my paper. And the thing was it was a major 3rd party provider like Orbitz, Expedia, or Travelocity (I forget which one at this point). And thus I have never since rented a Budget brand rental car for personal or business for about 25 years now. I also stopped using 3rd party sites for booking things. I may search across all providers on those sites occasionally, but then book the same deal directly through the actual provider.

2)nd story has had no real impact on me, but the rental car place was essentially out of rentals but had a SUV brought back a few hours before with front passenger side damage. No mechanical issues, just major dents to that front quarter panel. Said they already had it in their system, blah, blah... After returning it to the literal guy that had checked it in from the damage creating customer a few days prior (short but interesting conversation about how they weren't sure how they were going to handle my late night rental pick up, etc...). Needless to say they tried to charge me with the damage after I got home; even after I re-explained that it had happened prior to my pick-up. Foolishly I only took a pick of the damage the next morning after such a dark late night pickup in a poorly lit lot. After they refused to reassign the damage to the prior renter, I just never bothered to respond to them. The $ were surprisingly too small for them to sue me or something (couple $K), and I sure didn't do the damage so I sure wasn't paying them a dime nor for my own lawyer to futz around with it. Any of that stuff for a Colo person is legally wiped clean after 7 years anyway. So I just didn't rent from them for a few years. It was a smaller time rental place since merged into one of todays conglomerates.

 

[jamesdeluxe]

2)nd story

To confirm that I understood correctly:

• You arrived late at night and all they had on the lot was a car with existing damage.
• At that point, you had no choice but to take it and didn't get any written proof that you didn't cause said damage.
• You brought it back and they tried to charge you for the damage.
• Despite that experience, at some point in the future you rented again from that same company?

 

[EMSC]

any written proof that you didn't cause said damage.

Stupid, but after a very long day I wasn't thinking straight and only got verbal confirmation from them that they knew about it and had already handled it.

• Despite that experience, at some point in the future you rented again from that same company?

Not directly. That was a smaller group that got absorbed by a much bigger group (not surprising given the quality of their keeping track of things). That brand disappeared as far as I know and I have rented from other brands under the larger acquiring Corp names over time. Though I did make sure to not rent from even the larger Corp for a few years after acquisition just to be safe.

 

[jamesdeluxe]

Stupid, but after a very long day I wasn't thinking straight and only got verbal confirmation from them that they knew about it and had already handled it.

I get that part of it. Also, I assume that this may have happened many moons ago when an employee's verbal reassurance ("don't worry, we made a note of it on your account") didn't require a signed, notarized statement corroborated by two witnesses and a time-stamped video.

the rental car place was essentially out of rentals but had a SUV

I've mentioned before how several times at DEN (U.S. rental car hell) the only reasonable option that didn't require a 15-minute shuttle to somewhere on Colfax was this off-brand company, where, even if you'd reserved an economy sedan, all they ever had on the lot during the warm-weather months were yellow Jeep Wranglers -- they must've gotten a deal on hundreds of them.

Helping my 85-year-old mother in and out of that monster was a delight. Reminds me of seeing soccer moms driving their tanks to King Soopers for a half gallon of milk.

 

[EMSC]

DEN (U.S. rental car hell)

Interestingly having never rented a car here, it was a long time before I ever heard about how annoying it is to get to the rental cars. Last I heard DIA wants to build a huge parking garage along there with light rail service from the terminal and force all the rental cars into that one location. Probably a decade to make that happen though.

 

[Skieric]

Interestingly having never rented a car here, it was a long time before I ever heard about how annoying it is to get to the rental cars. Last I heard DIA wants to build a huge parking garage along there with light rail service from the terminal and force all the rental cars into that one location. Probably a decade to make that happen though frequent renter in Denver,

I rent regularly in Denver. Unfortunately, after the pandemic their rates have more then doubled. Shuttles to the rental car lots, however usually run regularly and the lots are just off the access road. Therefore the location doest seem to bother me too much. The airport is huge and therefore I understand the car rental center is never going to be as convenient as smaller airports.

 

[jamesdeluxe]

Shuttles to the rental car lots, however usually run regularly and the lots are just off the access road. Therefore the location doesn't seem to bother me too much. The airport is huge and therefore I understand the car rental center is never going to be as convenient as smaller airports.

The obvious best-case scenario for a large airport is to have the rental center be reachable by foot (e.g. SLC, Zurich) or to have it connected via a train (e.g. Chicago, Newark, Atlanta). There's no putting lipstick on shuttle buses: unsexy and unpleasant. I've mentioned before that no one understood why Denver's current airport, when built in the late 80s/early 90s, didn't include a train system extension to a centralized car rental center -- maybe because they spent so much money on the disastrous luggage system?

For the record, I realise that our DEN rental car complaints are first-world problems.

Last I heard DIA wants to build a huge parking garage along there with light rail service from the terminal and force all the rental cars into that one location. Probably a decade to make that happen though.

Better late than never; however, I'm dubious about a ten-year timeline and doubt I'll live to see it. For my visit later today, I'm passing on a rental car and will take the light rail to my mother's senior residence near Iliff and 225.

 

[ChrisC]

I've mentioned before how several times at DEN (U.S. rental car hell) the only reasonable option that didn't require a 15-minute shuttle to somewhere on Colfax was this off-brand company

Like, take a shuttle to downtown Denver?

The monopolistic rental car pricing in Denver and SLC is just one more reason I have given up on those states' metro areas for skiing. Inflated rental car price, and then pay, and make reservations at the EpicIkon resorts. Then, utilize the ski pass you paid for 6 months ago and made a reservation for. Enough. Chances of a powder day under $500 on a weekend? Effectively zero.

I do have friends in Denver, and I mostly ski A-Basin and/or Loveland during the primary season, sometimes Breck or Copper overnight.

 

[Tony Crocker]

Thankfully I have had 11 ski trips to Colorado this century and only flown into DIA and rented a car on two of them. I have not rented a car in SLC since I bought my Iron Blosam timeshare in 2008.

I have dramatic increases in U.S. car rental price post pandemic. They were ~$100/day in South Carolina in fall 2021 and in Oregon in summer 2022. I don't recall another US car rental since then though of course there have been a ton of them in other countries, all of them less expensive per day than those two except for the "you arrived 4 hours later than your reservation" ripoff in Mexico in 2024.

The late April/early May 2015 car rental in DIA was memorable for the snow dump that occurred the early evening before we were flying out the next morning. We got a hotel room close to DIA and the snowstorm hit while we were out to dinner. I decided to return the car that evening and it took at least 45 minutes to get a shuttle back to the hotel. The next morning shuttle was without incident as the storm was over even though 6 inches were on the ground from it.

 

[EMSC]

I have dramatic increases in U.S. car rental price post pandemic.

Very true. The rental car places shot themselves in the foot by selling off all their inventory early in the pandemic only to turn around and re-buy cars at top $$ only 2 years later (if they could even get any). The post-pandemic travel bump helped them justify the pricing increases at the time, but I sense that things are not going as well for them this summer. The advertising I've been seeing feels more desperate than last 2 years from them.

 

[Skieric]

Very true. The rental car places shot themselves in the foot by selling off all their inventory early in the pandemic only to turn around and re-buy cars at top $$ only 2 years later (if they could even get any). The post-pandemic travel bump helped them justify the pricing increases at the time, but I sense that things are not going as well for them this summer. The advertising I've been seeing feels more desperate than last 2 years from them.

Thats good, hopefully the prices will start to come down. Right now for reasons that I can no longer understand, the USA is the most expensive place I find to travel. Switzerland was even less expensive, when I was there last year.