Author Topic: Alternatives to rental car agencies  (Read 2599 times)

ObviouslyNotAGolfer

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Alternatives to rental car agencies
« on: February 02, 2019, 07:32:16 PM »
My wife and I take frequent road trips up to SF Bay area and/or the California Central Coast (to escape the horror of living in SoCal). Travel (incl. going to Europe every other year) is one of my big priorities in life, in addition to FIRE.

In any case, I drive an old beater Volvo that is extremely cheap and reliable to own. Also, my commute is fairly short, and I only go into the office two or three times a week for only part of the year (I'm an academic). The car is great as a daily driver, but I am not happy driving a 28 y.o. brick long distances, so we always rent.

Butt! I am so freaking sick of rental car agencies and all their ridiculous ripoff BS and horrible customer service! Last time, I rented from a nationwide chain, and reserved through Costco. Lakcadasical, piss-poor service, could not care less about anything. When they brought the key and the BS for me to sign, the amount was 92$ above what I reserved it for. Luckily, in the business world, I trust NO one and always have documentation. I showed them the e-mail on my phone, and they backed off a little, the second time overcharging me by only $27. "The system" would not let them give me a lower price. What a joke! The manager gave me a worthless verbal promise not to overcharge me when I returned the car. I told the manager to write down the price on his business card and initial it. I just wanted to get out of there (15+ minutes of my time wasted!)

Then, I returned it a week later and showed it to the returns dude (some sort of managment trainee), and he said "uh, ok, uh let's see". "Well, I was able to get it down to $$$$ [this time only ripping me off by $2!]. I protested again (more of my time wasted) and he finally got it down to a few cents lower than what I reserved for. Imagine, wasting that much of everyone's time in a pathetic attempt to rip me off by a couple bucks!!! 

So sick of it all!! Too many stories. Rental car agencies are just about the worst!!! We rented with Dooley in Ireland for three weeks and they were great, and Alamo has been ok for the most part, but Hertz, Avis, Enterprise, Dollar have all caused me ridiculous headaches!

What are the alternatives? Zipcar? seems like an expensive pain. There is this other company that only rents Audis (which I have zero interest in-AND they die unexpectedly on the freeway and no one knows why!!!). What else?? Any ideas???

Thanks!

« Last Edit: February 02, 2019, 07:35:56 PM by ObviouslyNotAGolfer »

katscratch

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Re: Alternatives to rental car agencies
« Reply #1 on: February 02, 2019, 07:41:57 PM »
Car swapping with friends? Train or bus?

I rent often, usually through Priceline so that I'm never paying more than $20/day, and pick up from various agencies at the major airport in my city. I've actually never had an issue with billing or service from any of the major companies or the few smaller companies that I've used, and they've all honored some crazy deals I've had at times, like Priceline's choose your price feature once netting me a 3-day rental for $15 total. Maybe it's a (very unfortunate) trend in your area - you could try researching reviews of different companies or pickup sites in neighboring towns to see if it might be worth driving your car there if service is better.

I agree that an hourly rental option would be crazy spendy and may have mileage restrictions anyway.

You could try ridesharing to and from your destination then rent a car locally in your destination city.

Hopefully others will have ideas - I'm lucky to live in an area with a lot of transportation options so haven't had to think outside the box much.

ETA - I thought of something else - do you usually rent through third party sites, and if so, have you tried renting through the company directly? If Priceline doesn't have a super low price I'll rent through Enterprise directly. I've done it enough that they "know" me in their system and I get excellent service and always get a free upgrade. My parents have had the same experience when they've visited here, through an Enterprise office in a suburb - my mom always asks for the same rental agent when she calls to make a reservation.

If you travel often and can't find another option aside from rentals, maybe book directly through Alamo and work to develop a client relationship with them.
« Last Edit: February 02, 2019, 07:45:23 PM by katscratch »

ObviouslyNotAGolfer

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Re: Alternatives to rental car agencies
« Reply #2 on: February 02, 2019, 07:44:40 PM »
Thanks for your reply.

I will tell you that the vast majority of the problems I have had have been in SoCal, which is an absolutely horrible place, where the knives are out for everybody 247365. (I was born here and have lived here most of my life in fact). Undoubtedly that is part of the issue!

katscratch

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Re: Alternatives to rental car agencies
« Reply #3 on: February 02, 2019, 07:47:30 PM »
My dad's family is mostly in California and are slowly migrating northward :) 

It's been a while since I've traveled south of Oregon but I was suspecting the "service culture" might be a bit different than here in the conflict-avoidant Midwest ;)

--I cross-posted so don't know if you saw my edit above. If you absolutely have to rent that might be the best bet, trying to always use the same rental agent to book through.
« Last Edit: February 02, 2019, 07:49:19 PM by katscratch »

terran

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Re: Alternatives to rental car agencies
« Reply #4 on: February 02, 2019, 08:41:12 PM »
It's not an alternative, but have you ever rented from Enterprise? My experience has been that they have significantly lower levels of BS than other car rental companies. YMMV of course.

I've also signed up for the premium rental coverage through AMEX, which for $20/rental (up to 30 days I think) acts as the primary insurance. Makes me more confident turning down the rental company insurance without worrying they'll pull some crap, although none have yet.

radram

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Re: Alternatives to rental car agencies
« Reply #5 on: February 02, 2019, 09:04:22 PM »
Just try to take your own car once.

Bring your title with you on your trip. If it breaks down, scrap it and find a nearby rental to finish your trip and get you home.

I would bet you would have several trips before you had any trouble. Use the savings to buy a new used car when your car craps out .

dragoncar

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Re: Alternatives to rental car agencies
« Reply #6 on: February 03, 2019, 12:25:12 AM »
I'm actually curious which agencies you've had bad experiences with.  My experiences with Budget, Alamo, and National have been really good.  It might help to sign up for the free loyalty program.  With Budget, they have the paperwork ready to go and you skip the line.  Never got an upsell.  With Alamo, you use a friggin automated kiosk and just walk out and get your car.  With National, you don't even have to use a kiosk, you just go pick the car you want.  All of them you have to show your DL and credit card at the exit gate but there's no upsell by that point.  On return they all just check the odometer and print a receipt within a minute.
Maybe it's different at airport locations, because that's all I've ever used.

edit: sorry, I see you named/shamed the companies.  My point still stands about the above companies so I guess I just got lucky early on and stuck with the winners.  Yes, there are carsharing apps that you could try but I can't speak to them.  I'll also add that I once got Hertz through my insurance company and it was also dead simple.
« Last Edit: February 03, 2019, 12:29:22 AM by dragoncar »

Just Joe

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Re: Alternatives to rental car agencies
« Reply #7 on: February 03, 2019, 09:51:43 AM »
My employer does alot of business with Enterprise and we employees get the same rates as our employer even for personal use. That's who I default to. Always the same manager and I know him well, no BS.

I've used this situation to rent a car for personal out of state trips b/c at one point both our cars were ancient like your's. I trusted them for in ~200 mile radius trips, not so much for multiple states away. We now have a nice car and an old car. Old car stays local.

HipGnosis

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Re: Alternatives to rental car agencies
« Reply #8 on: February 03, 2019, 10:42:29 AM »
Turo P2P car rental.  https://turo.com/
You will have to calculate your average miles per day.  Some owner/renters allow you to go farther for a bit more money, but you need to arrange that before you get the car.

Annie101

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Re: Alternatives to rental car agencies
« Reply #9 on: February 03, 2019, 07:22:18 PM »
I just booked a car on Turo for our next vacation.  It's in two weeks, so I don't know yet if it will be a success.  We wanted a minivan and this was cheaper...

Dee18

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Re: Alternatives to rental car agencies
« Reply #10 on: February 03, 2019, 07:25:58 PM »
I use autoslash.com to find the best deal.  It will keep checking even after you make a reservation.

soccerluvof4

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Re: Alternatives to rental car agencies
« Reply #11 on: February 04, 2019, 06:45:35 AM »
I too have found Enterprise to be the most hassle free and I have never had charge issues (knock on wood) but have with alot of the others you have mentioned.

mschaus

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Re: Alternatives to rental car agencies
« Reply #12 on: February 04, 2019, 11:42:16 AM »
Yup, you'll want Turo.com and getaround.com for p2p car sharing for multiple days. Just like the previous poster mentioned, make sure you understand the included mileage.

I used to host on Turo and it was a great experience for me and the renters.

(also, I've lived in Santa Barbara and San Jose, and it was all quite pleasant. But I sure hated going to LAX, ha! Probably because I had to drive there, but if I was already in the area that would solve that issue.)

ketchup

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Re: Alternatives to rental car agencies
« Reply #13 on: February 04, 2019, 11:48:26 AM »
Back when we had only one car, we'd rent a lot.  GF gets rentals when flying for business often too.  We've used Hertz, Enterprise, Alamo, Avis, and Silvercar.

Avis was the most stuck-in-the-stone-age with ancient dot matrix printers (seriously, last year) and everything took forever.  Enterprise and Hertz have been on average the simplest/fastest of the traditional rental companies.  And Silvercar was super easy/fast/no-BS, but they're expensive (though when GF used them, so was everyone else) and not widespread.

I will say that each rental location (regardless of branding) varies a lot.  If you find one nearby in particular that less bullshitty, stick to them.

wbarnett

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Re: Alternatives to rental car agencies
« Reply #14 on: February 04, 2019, 01:09:59 PM »
Turo P2P car rental.  https://turo.com/
You will have to calculate your average miles per day.  Some owner/renters allow you to go farther for a bit more money, but you need to arrange that before you get the car.

+1 for Turo. It's seamless, often cheaper than big agencies, and you can pickup the car at convenient places instead of an airport. A quick warning about accidents, though -- most credit card companies don't consider Turo to be a 'rental car agency', so the damage waiver clause of your credit card agreement won't apply. And if you do get in an accident, Turo's customer service people are not helpful.

patchyfacialhair

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Re: Alternatives to rental car agencies
« Reply #15 on: February 04, 2019, 01:20:00 PM »
I always book with Budget, and always have a good experience. Both my wife and I are part of the Fastbreak program (free), to where you can skip the line (no upsells or questions about insurance), go straight to the car, and drive away. All I do is just make sure to save the email with the quoted price, and when I return the car, they print me a receipt right then and there, and it has always matched the quoted price.

We get upgraded to "nicer" cars around half the time as well, which is nice, but we never feel entitled to an upgrade. Works great for business and personal travel. At least, that's our experience having used them coast to coast and many places in between.