Hertz is now a financial instrument run by private equity and investment bankers.
Businessmen want money the same way you or I want money. They just want to run a business in order to make that money. The same way novelists want to write novels to pay the bills. The book has to be good, people have to like the book so that they buy the book and tell other people to buy the book. So goes business.
Financial instruments are disposable, to be squeezed and wrung of every available cent until it becomes untenable and then the owners drop it and move on. If they can cut, squeeze, and extract they will. If they cannot-- they will destroy the instrument and the trick is they never lose money doing the destruction. People who run financial instruments masquerading as business don't want money like you and I. They want money the way addicts want heroin.
For one, are fees "higher when renting vehicles from Hertz stores that use UVeye scanners, as opposed to those that don’t"?
Can a renter get "estimates of what different kinds of damage typically cost"?
(quotes from the article).
I'm pretty sure that want to use automated scanners for this because if they had human agent make the same claims, and charge $440 for that scuff, then there would be a blowup right away, and keeping employees willing to deal with that anger all the time is hard.
I'm pretty sure I've scuffed up a rental car like that, and didn't get dinged at all. It's a rental car, and normal wear-and-tear should be part of the regular depreciation.
The fees seem high for such a small blemish. Automated rule enforcing systems are very frustrating to hit. They usually enforce good rules, but overly strictly and often trend into gotchas that are intentionally exploitive. (Eg, red light cameras that have reduced yellow light times.) I doubt the savings of those fees being put into renters who do leave damage marks will be passed on to those who don't.
They insisted, but could provide no proof, that it did, and told him to prove that it didn't, but obviously he hadn't thought to document _missing, optional pieces he didn't know were equipped in a car he didn't own_.
It's a complete scam: they hit everyone for the missing parcel shelf and see who's stupid enough to pay up. He obviously didn't and told them to pound sand.
That being said, I just rented from Enterprise in Zurich and the car was < 300 km brand new, I was renter #2. Sure enough, the X3 had a parcel shelf, and you better believe I documented its presence upon its return.
I'm from EU and I don't see why this wouldn't be allowed? They have proof of what the wheel looked like when the car was rented out and they have proof of what it looked like when it was returned - if it's clearly damaged then why would they not be able to charge you for it?
Worst I had was they ripped the door off a rental on a lamppost, and even though I had a video (one take) of the car being in good condition, their office being closed, and the clock behind their counter, they threatened me with court unless I paid them €2,000.
On the other hand, this does make me wonder if there ought to be a threshold for damage. A small scratch to a panel can result in a very expensive panel replacement, and the car is still totally driveable and most people renting won't notice or care.
It would be one thing if minor damage could just be "buffed out", but it can't. But when the only repair option is an entire expensive replacement of a component, is that really fair? Do people really need their rental cars to be perfectly pristine? Are they willing to pay these exorbitant damage fees in order to ensure that?
That wasn't always the case and it's good to know.
Even if we made them by law it would just be a stupid tax on insurance companies, proceeds from which would fund unreasonably pristine rental cars. This still sounds like a net negative for society to me.
Them asking you to pay $450 to have it repaired but not documenting that your $450 actually went to repairing it is nuts. That's not a repair fee, that's a penalty, and for something that might not even have been your fault to begin with.
I would not expect to have to pay for this sort of "damage", AI or otherwise.
I'd bet that the scanner will catch all those damages and any deviation from showroom floor condition will be flagged. But then Hertz will just pocket the fees as profit without actually effecting repairs.
They already accepted little dings and scratches before as regular wear and tear on the vehicles. This just opens up an effectively effort free revenue stream.
I tried with their customer service to work it out, but they just gave me the runaround, so I disputed the charge with my credit card and I never heard anything about it after that.
If the next counter argument is that they're recovering the eventual loss in value because of the accumulation of minor damage, then that is kind of admitting it as 'normal wear and tear'. Anything they're not actually fixing, they shouldn't be trying to charge people for.
That's a fantastic point, thank you!
In which case, surely there ought to be a consumer protection law against it? It feels like straight-up fraud. And this doesn't apply just to car damage, but with security deposits for apartments, etc. If you don't repair it, you don't get to charge for it.
I can partially understand if Hertz is considering it to be additional depreciation on the value of the car when they eventually sell it. But even in that case, the depreciation is nowhere near the value of repair, because a buyer won't perform the repairs either. So if Hertz can charge damages that are a proportion of total damages across many renters that can be justified as resulting in a lower resell price, then OK maybe. But that would be what per-renter -- like $10 or something?
So I think the point still stands then. How is this not outright fraud? Or at least some related concept that ought to be legislated?
I personally only rent, when I have to, from companies to at least try to repair minor damage. It's clear that some put an effort in, while some (Hertz, Enterprise) do not.
But my comment isn't about the companies not fixing the damage, it's about them charging for the damage and then not fixing it.
I’d be curious on who I should consider since the major ones clearly do not, across my experience of dozens of rentals across the US and EU.
Friends of mine had to go to court to get back a security deposit for an apartment that they had been told was going to be completely gutted (and was) at the conclusion of their lease. The management company wanted to hold $2,000 of security for damage (which, to be clear, was there, though arguably not $2,000 worth) in things that they had demolished within 72 hours of the termination of the lease, and things that they had told them would be demolished.
This was also small claims.
If you've ever rented a car, most rental cars have a number of scratches like this one. If they're charging the customers to repair every little scratch, does that mean they're guaranteeing every car you rent from now on is going to be absolutely pristine, or are they just going to pocket the cash?
Anyhow I don't want to have to worry about whether Hertz is going to want to charge me a couple of thousand bucks to repaint a door if someone dings it with a shopping cart, so they're off the list. Luckily there are many other options.
They then ran my details through some "ID verification system" that "couldn't confirm my identity sufficiently" (though they were very vague about what that actually meant - I had a green card and in-state driver's license).
"We're not going to be able to rent to you today."
Me, already over it and figuring out the next nearest rental place: "Sure, fine. Just refund my rental fee and I'll be on my way."
"Sorry, prepaid rentals are non-refundable."
Excuse me? No.
It did get resolved, but not there. Required two or three calls to corporate, which is two or three more than it should.
No, it's not fair. What you owe them is deprecation of the vehicle value consequent to the damage, not cost to make it perfect again. For example, if I get in a car accident, my insurance looks at cost to repair and if it's too high, they "total" the car and pay the value of it.
There are also other complexities - a windshield crack because a dump truck kicked up a stone on the highway, someone keys your car or knocks into the door, or bumps your car while it sits parallel parked. Of course the rental agency can say "you rented it, it was under your watch, and it came back like this" which is a shady thing to say
These are the sounds a business makes as it is dying.
(Many other sources discuss this aspect of AI: the necessity of trust from the consumer. I think we'll see a lot more of this in the coming years, either because big tech simply ignores the problem and overrides the objections by volume, as in the case of online reviews, or because there'll be some high profile flameouts.)
Of course, this is the same Hertz that torched 2 billion dollars on an EV gamble that failed, and whose stock price has been on a slide ever since the pandemic. Back in 2020, Hertz was trading just above Avis. Five years later, and Avis is $176 and Hertz is $7.
[0] https://archive.is/iG4M1 (Bloomberg)
After already having been resurrected! With a “significantly deleveraged balance sheet and right-sized, efficient operations,” no less!
https://newsroom.hertz.com/press-releases/press-release-deta...
The scanner found some damage that simply was not possible for me to have incurred, and I just explained that in the webform they sent and the charges went away a few days later. Makes me wonder if this whole process is worth actually worth it to the rental companies.
F THAT!
Using that as a template, I would find it difficult to argue against a claim. e.g., the evaluator linked above permits any bumper scratches smaller than 6 inches, or a wheel scratch less than 2 inches. I feel like it permits reasonable wear and tear.
However, the example in the article was for 1-inch wheel damage, which would be permitted by the evaluator, so I guess the AI flags _any_ damage. I wonder how receptive these businesses will be to negotiation and pushback. Maybe they'll capitulate if you push hard enough, but it puts an unfair burden on the customer to argue against unreasonable claims (likely by design to maximise cash collection).
My last trip to California- the guy at the counter told me to go wait at some area for a car to come in, in my class. I went and waited. I saw three foreign asian guys there too - they got in a car and drove off but 15 minutes they were back and got out of their car, I assume because it was the wrong class.
I realized then that this was bs - we had no info on what was an appropriate car for our class and that we were sent to this purgatory because we didn't buy the extra insurance or something.
So I looked up what cars were in my class and wandered the lot and found a very nice car in its class. Got inside and drove it to the exit. They checked my paperwork and the class, approved it, and let me go.
Anchorage, similar story - arrive just before closing time after a long flight.
They try to pull some blatantly scammy shit, that "in order to decline our optional insurance, we need to actually open a claim on your insurance to verify your coverage". Me: "Here's their app, you can see that here." "We need to actually open a claim..." (How would that even work, a 'proactive claim') "... and we're about to close so we might not be able to finish processing your rental this evening."
Ate the fee for their insurance waivers, and vowed never to rent from Hertz again.
toomuchtodo•7mo ago
JohnFen•7mo ago
Yes, yes they are. https://www.npr.org/2022/12/06/1140998674/hertz-false-accusa...
Never do business with Hertz.
jasonthorsness•7mo ago
sidewndr46•7mo ago
imglorp•7mo ago
Same thing we're seeing with United Healthcare: shareholders see a horrifying, inhumane, murderous but profitable denial policy and clap with glee. The system is broken.
sidewndr46•7mo ago
TheChaplain•7mo ago
amy214•7mo ago
YawningAngel•7mo ago
alwa•7mo ago
“The big well-established company is straight-up lying to me about this supposed crime that happened, and fabricating the documentation that proves it” seems like a heuristic that would not normally be the right one…
I’ve personally had to pursue cases where somebody just took a fleet rental vehicle across the country and started driving Uber with it. It was basically written off as “shrug guess we lost it” (!) until the org got a recent speed camera ticket in the mail. Somehow I feel like the default case that makes it to the police turns out to be closer to that situation than to “the organization alwa was working with just fabricated this bizarre tale on a lark.” It’s so much easier to just write it off as a loss, or handle it without LE.
I feel like it’s not just the US system that’s ill-prepared for well-reputed large institutions to fabricate tales of victimhood and extensive paper trails to “back it up.” Well… “paper” trails from poorly-implemented computer systems, anyway…
The UK police (and also their courts) were similarly ill-prepared when the Post Office and Fujitsu straight-up lied about missing money in the Horizon scandal.
gambiting•7mo ago
Not only it's not, keeping the car for longer than you rented it for isn't theft, it's a breach of contract and it's a civil not criminal matter. So indeed, Police shouldn't be involved at all.
alwa•7mo ago
The guy who took the car across many states and started driving Uber with it—he’d been assigned the vehicle for 3 days, claimed to have brought it back to the yard, but actually was using it to make his living every day for 6 months by the time we heard about it… surely that’s a bit closer to “he took it” than “he messed up the return date,” isn’t it?
gambiting•7mo ago
Not legally, no. It's still a breach of contract and the company can sue you for damages and obviously for the value of the car, but it's not technically theft.
YawningAngel•7mo ago
citrin_ru•7mo ago
lucianbr•7mo ago
Unless you as a customer have some advantage over the other customers allowing you to avoid the penalty more often than normal. But on average, it must be non-cheap.
toomuchtodo•7mo ago
madaxe_again•7mo ago