Rental Car Hell, Looking for Alternatives

[Pdub]

How do you signal to the vendor that you are more valuable a customer than Joe LowestPrice in front of you?

• Sign up for their loyalty program
• Book Directly via their Website, and not a 3rd party travel search engine-even if this means you are paying a little bit more.

The business oriented Rental car companies have a better chance for customer satisfaction as business travelers highly value time over the bottom price. Especially at a bigger facility with their sister companies, the vendor can pull from the cheaper brand fleet and make the leisure traveler wait

The only available signal in this case was Gold Club membership, and I saw no one bypassing the line for this reason. Everyone had to wait on the same single file line leading to the one open spot at the one desk, whether they were traveling for business or pleasure. There certainly was not a separate line for loyal customers or people who found their deal on the Hertz website vs Hotwire! Granted I could have missed some Gold Club members walking straight to their cars.

Travel nowadays is overwhelmingly for pleasure. Almost everyone on that line was a family or couple, and everyone we met was traveling for fun or family reasons. You meet a lot of people when everyone is pissed off about the same thing and there's time to chat!

As far as pulling cars from other fleets... The only open desks were Hertz and Avis. All others were closed with signs reading "Go to Hertz" or "Go to Avis". So I guess they were pulling from other fleets, but on this particular occasion there were no other fleets to rent from. I presume this is also related to the car and personnel shortages. And this was on a Friday afternoon at a busy airport.

Bigger may be better, but BWI is pretty big (22nd busiest in US) and the rental car facility was huge.

I initially regretted not driving the 6 hours instead of flying, but our return trip was smooth as butter and that certainly changes the equation. I have to work early Monday so driving all day Sunday kind of sucks.

Lessons leaned:
1. Hertz, never again
2. Join special membership clubs giving direct skip-the-line access every time going forward
3. Turo is worth a try, can't get much worse. (Still hoping to hear from someone with experience)

 

[tch]

Very location-specific experience: we went to Maui in April. Searched for rental cars and was very discouraged. Found a couple of local companies and decided to go with one. Older but perfectly adequate Honda CRV ran $300 for 9 days when national chains were quoting over $700/week for sedans.
I understand Maui might have more opportunities for business like that, but it‘s got me wondering about local rent-a-wreck kinds of places.

 

[Jim McDonald]

FWIW I've used RuggedRental outside the SLC airport on numerous occasions; decent vehicles, competitive or better pricing, no complaints.

 

[SkiSVLikeAgassi]

I am going to Europe for a month and need to fly out of SLC. Quote for a one-way trip SV to SLC and drop off was $375.
On the return, SLC to SV the quote was $450. So $825 to drive a car basically for 8 hours...

Rental prices are absolutely insane!
I decided it was way cheaper to drive my car and leave it at the airport for a month.
Not happy about that, but the rental numbers don't make any sense...

 

[Philpug]

I decided it was way cheaper to drive my car and leave it at the airport for a month.

Do you know anyone in the area that you can leave the car with? Anyone here want to do it...for half the cost of airport long term?

 

[SKI-3PO]

Hawaii wants you to stop using U-Hauls as rental cars - The Points Guy

The Hawaii Tourism Authority has added resources to its website on alternate transportation options during the rental car shortage.

thepointsguy.com

 

[Philpug]

Hawaii wants you to stop using U-Hauls as rental cars - The Points Guy

The Hawaii Tourism Authority has added resources to its website on alternate transportation options during the rental car shortage.

thepointsguy.com

Thats why I suggested Home Depot.

 

[SkiSVLikeAgassi]

Do you know anyone in the area that you can leave the car with? Anyone here want to do it...for half the cost of airport long term?

Working on that...

Either way, at ~$8/day, the hit is very manageable...

 

[crosscountry]

Working on that...

Either way, at ~$8/day, the hit is very manageable...

What about those deals at airport hotel where you can stay the night and then park for free (for how long I don't know)?

 

[David Chaus]

Ketchum/Hailey are expensive locations to rent a car.

I wonder though about one way car rentals to/from Boise with a connecting flight to SLC.

 

[Tricia]

Phil and I seized the opportunity and bought plane tickets(when airfare was affordable a few months ago) to visit family in Alaska at the end of July. Since we're visiting family we won't need a rental car, but I just looked at rental options for the heck of it and every place I looked says, "Sorry we have no rental car options available for your dates."

@Wendy had issues with $$ of her rental car in Denver back at the end of April. I can't recall exactly what the issue was. Edit: I see she posted it earlier in the thred.

 

[Wendy]

Phil and I seized the opportunity and bought plane tickets(when airfare was affordable a few months ago) to visit family in Alaska at the end of July. Since we're visiting family we won't need a rental car, but I just looked at rental options for the heck of it and every place I looked says, "Sorry we have no rental car options available for your dates."

@Wendy had issues with $$ of her rental car in Denver back at the end of April. I can't recall exactly what the issue was. Edit: I see she posted it earlier in the thred.

Just got off the phone with my husband, who’s doing fieldwork in Utah. His rental car experience (corporate) was good….got a large 4WD (which he needed) and said it was unbelievably clean and the process was smooth (rented from SLC Airport…Enterprise). However, he said the hotels have jacked up prices like crazy due to the post-Covid travel boom. He (well, his grant) is paying twice the hotel rate he paid 2 years ago.

When European travel opens up more, I can see the advantages to that: It’s far easier to get around there without a rental car. We were originally planning to visit friends in Spain this summer (then decided to hold off)….but we can fly into Madrid and just take a train to their coastal town.

 

[djetok]

One of the reasons I usually drive to the mountains is the car rental experience - never good, and now worse. Sounds like an upstart customer friendly car rental company could gain a following.

totally agree 1000 % . We used to exclusively ski I70. We are a 11 hour drive one way. We started driving up , while our ski buddies flew up. They would beat us by an hour or so. As soon as we showed up, they griped about the rental car experience. Plus now, I don't have to worry about damage to our equipment.

 

[Tricia]

totally agree 1000 % . We used to exclusively ski I70. We are a 11 hour drive one way. We started driving up , while our ski buddies flew up. They would beat us by an hour or so. As soon as we showed up, they griped about the rental car experience. Plus now, I don't have to worry about damage to our equipment.

The couple times @Philpug and I flew this year we were reminded just how badly luggage gets beaten up on airlines.
When he flew to NC to pick up our new SS SkiTalk (Meet the new S.S.SkiTalk) he took his golf clubs and I flew to meet him in Denver with our skis so we could optimize this unplanned cross country trip.
When I arrived in Denver, Phil pointed out a huge grease spot on my white vest and my shirt. After looking closer, it had rubbed off from the ski bag while I was haranging it into the elevator. (my annoyance of having to use the elevator with ski luggage at a known ski destination is a whole differetn talk show topic)
Fortunately I got the grease out of the vest, shirt and ski bag but jeez!!
That's not even accounting for the other wear and tear on our luggage on that one trip.

Fortunately, Phil was meeting me with the new rig so we didn't have to deal with rental cars. Although....if we did deal with rental cars, I woudln't have had to load my luggage in the elevator to go down to personal pick up.

 

[dbostedo]

...my annoyance of having to use the elevator with ski luggage at a known ski destination...

Elevators are OK... I sometimes have had to go up and down escalators, which is more of a pain when I've got my rolling suitcase, rolling ski case, and a backpack.

 

[SkiSVLikeAgassi]

We were originally planning to visit friends in Spain this summer (then decided to hold off)….but we can fly into Madrid and just take a train to their coastal town.

Spain has graciously moved past the full-on PCR test to the rapid antigen one. Unfortunately, they've also shortened the window to 48 hours, not 72. And Spain being Spain, it's before arrival not departure, so those of us that live in the boondocks will have a tough time with that.

And it remains to be seen how on earth you're going to prove you're vaccinated. The CDC card, as of now,
is not sufficient. You need the European digital certification (passport) with a barcode, which, of course, the US is not participating in. Hopefully, this will all change in the next coming weeks, but never ever underestimate
the absolute idiocy of Spanish bureaucracy...

 

[DanoT]

Hawaii wants you to stop using U-Hauls as rental cars - The Points Guy

The Hawaii Tourism Authority has added resources to its website on alternate transportation options during the rental car shortage.

thepointsguy.com

I have heard of people renting U-Haul box truck and turning it into an instant vacation RV using a camp stove and bed and cheap Ikea furniture.

 

[Sibhusky]

Locally, they started telling us in April there are no rental cars left, many have been moved to bigger areas. The U-haul and Turo options are apparently a bust as well, according to Reddit. Either you've booked a vehicle already or you're hitchhiking. There is actually some family having a reunion and they are flying into 3 different airports based on rental car bookings, then driving here. Some car dealers are renting.

 

[Philpug]

I remember when I was selling Volvos, people would scheddule Friday service appointments with their S40/S60's to try to get a XC70/XC90 for the weekend to take to the shore or mountains.

 

[Wendy]

The couple times @Philpug and I flew this year we were reminded just how badly luggage gets beaten up on airlines.
When he flew to NC to pick up our new SS SkiTalk (Meet the new S.S.SkiTalk) he took his golf clubs and I flew to meet him in Denver with our skis so we could optimize this unplanned cross country trip.
When I arrived in Denver, Phil pointed out a huge grease spot on my white vest and my shirt. After looking closer, it had rubbed off from the ski bag while I was haranging it into the elevator. (my annoyance of having to use the elevator with ski luggage at a known ski destination is a whole differetn talk show topic)
Fortunately I got the grease out of the vest, shirt and ski bag but jeez!!
That's not even accounting for the other wear and tear on our luggage on that one trip.

Fortunately, Phil was meeting me with the new rig so we didn't have to deal with rental cars. Although....if we did deal with rental cars, I woudln't have had to load my luggage in the elevator to go down to personal pick up.

On my flight home, both wheels got ripped out of my ski bag. Skis were fine but they were packed in scads of clothes!