Just so you kids in SF know, the car rental situation at LAX is head and shoulders better than at SFO.
At SFO I rode the train out, once stood in line for 45 minutes to get a car, went down and found the car in the space wasn't the car I was supposed to get (and the key didn't work), waited in line another 45 minutes, then got in the car to find out that it wanted an oil change, got a cell phone call from the police because my wife (who threw up twice on the plane) didn't know what happened to me, and then I remembered that I forgot to get a child seat in all the confusion for my two year old.
I drove the car perhaps 1000 miles in the next week, down to San Luis Obispo and out to the Sierra Nevada and around the Central Coast region. I never changed the oil (I was too traumatized to want to call Hertz.) This is why you don't want to buy a used rental car. On the way back we had some trouble with the brakes but we got back alive.
At LAX on the other hand, I got a ride on a shuttle bus to Hertz, spent about 5 minutes in line and drove out with a decent car.
(The mistake we made there was thinking we could drive north on the 405 at 5pm on a Friday, I really should have driven up La Cienga, but I can't blame Hertz for that.)
Not to give away secrets, but BMW drive now is at SFO, for $20 lifetime membership and $30/day, to rent BMW electric 1er.
The other trick I've found is hertz prestige collectio.n; you can reserve a cheap car, especially on weekends, then pay cash for an upgrade to something decent, which they incidentally also maintain better than fleet. I usually get a GL450 truck, which while it isn't very fuel efficient, is a great vehicle otherwise.
There is a discount code TECHSF for the $20 membership, and it is a maximum $30/day "during testing" which is probably going to be many months.
The other cool thing vs zipcar is they let you take the cars one way, so I do downtown Oakland to/from airport for $12, which is cheaper than anything but BART, and far faster. And easier with luggage. And since I seem to often need to be on a flight when BART is still closed, I either drive/park or drive now basically all the time.
The problem is the car isn't really very big, is heavy due to batteries and compromises, and if I drive it at all aggressively like my personal car, I can make it go sideways.
80 miles range and slow charging means it is basically SF-Oakland-Berkeley only, or maybe SF to Palo Alto and back. I burned 50% just driving downtown Oakland to ups depot in downtown SF to SFO, with 15 minutes of idling at UPS, somehow.
If someone did this with a better car, like a Tesla, I'd be all over it.
NOTE: As a heavy DriveNow user, they keep me up to date. I just heard this week from the fleet manager, Ed, that the $30 a day rate will be going away soon. sadpanda.jpg
$12/trip still makes sense for one-ways, but $30/day was awesome. At $30/day it was almost worth it to go across the bridge in HOVland in the morning and keep it all day.
And that's why I am a heavy DriveNow user. I keep them a month at a time. The nearest location to my house is across the street and the nearest location to my office is in the garage in the basement. It works extremely well, especially since I get carpool + free FasTrak + free charging + free parking (normally $475 in my work garage) + free maintenance + $100k insurance. But you already know this since you are a DriveNow user.
$900/month, better then lease + insurance + maintenance + gas + parking + bridge. By $500+ a month.
The problem is the car isn't really very big, is heavy due to batteries and compromises, and if I drive it at all aggressively like my personal car, I can make it go sideways.
Bummer. Doesn't sound much like the Ultimate Driving Machine.
I've had similar issues renting cars from Avis at SFO. Once reserved a mid-size and ended up with a Toyota 4-Runner that flat tired after five days. Ironically we got the flat tire on 101 800ft from the airport exit as we were returning the car. Spent 30 minutes on hold with Avis when calling for assistance, only to give up when a free NPO road-service vehicle spotted us and stopped to help.
Another time I went to Avis at SFO without a reservation only to be told they had no economy cars at all available, only large, sporty or high-end cars with a price tag to match them. I declined, got to the back of the line and booked a Toyota Corolla on my iPad at half the price I was quoted for the other cars, and ten minutes later I was driving out of there with a car they supposedly did not have.
I booked the Corolla for five days, but called to extend it anther two days. They never charged me for those two extra days though, which makes me wonder what state their car administration is in.
That's actually pretty normal. For most car rental companies, the weekly rate is equal to 5 days. So the two extra days likely weren't supposed to cost any more.
(It's a form of price discrimination: business travelers insensitive to cost typically rent for 4-5 days at a time, while personal users can get a better deal on a weekly rental.)
I think it's much of a muchness. I've had some pretty crappy experiences at LAX and SFO, and some good ones too. I've had some long waits at both, I think it really depends when you're arriving and what flights got in the same time as you.
BTW, tip for Hertz next time you're in SFO: if you're a gold member (which is free) you can bypass the counters, and just go straight to the car.
When that works, anyway. For me the success rate on actually walking into a car at SFO (with Hertz Gold) is below 50%. No idea why, but my coworkers have had similar experiences at SFO.
From my experience with Hertz at the DEN airport is that the attendants have been fairly dense and they don't listen to what you request. "Oh you want to change the credit card on the reservation" ... later when questioned "oh i would have to cancel the reservation and rebook it to do that" It hasn't happened just once.
This whole rigamorale is why I get Zipcars for long weekends even if it's going to turn out more expensive. I can't deal with the lines and the obnoxious clerks trying to upsell.
I'll go with Silvercar next time I'm in LA for a couple of days and need a car, just to avoid the obnoxiousness.
I was about to post something about how Zipcars aren't normally located around airports, but it seems as if now they're owned by Avis they're actually putting Zipcars in the Avis lots. There's 20 odd Zipcars in the Avis garage at LAX.
Of course, the expense can be somewhat (but not completely) offset by getting the gas for free!
I had a similar experience in Boston a couple months ago with Budget.
Waited in line more than an hour just to get to an agent, and when I finally got up there, I discovered what was taking so long: they had no cars available. They had only one or two people working returns, so as fast as they could process cars back in, they were sending them back out. For every person who got up to the counter, it was taking 10-15 minutes just to get them a car.
I was traveling with my wife and nine month old daughter. I had requested a car seat when I made the reservation, but, no surprise, no car seat when we got out to the car. Not only that, but they didn't even have any car seats at all - the manager had to go to another car rental agency and get a seat from them.
The whole thing from start to finish took just short of 2 hours.
So yeah, next time I travel, I'll definitely see if Silvercar is available. Even if we had to bring a car seat with us, just shaving the hour in line would have been been very welcome.
The best place I've seen yet is Fort Lauderdale's Hollywood International Airport. Shuttle straight to the huge car rental station, pick a company, get a car. The drive to Miami is short, too.
Portland, OR is actually pretty nice in that you don't need to leave the airport to rent your car. They're in the parking garage opposite the main terminal.
I know nothing about the operation of car rental companies, but I'm guessing they change them less often than every 3000 miles, which is typically when the lights come on, I think. They probably just forgot to reset the light. I'd expect them to keep track of the mileage and ignore the oil change indicators. Pure speculation here, though.
Newer cars no longer need 3000 mile oil changes. Most cars with synthetic need an oil change every 7500 miles, BMW's for example only need an oil change every 15k miles.
3k would be a waste, the oil is practically still new at that point.
LAX rental was no picnic for me. Visited for a week last month and pre-paid for a rental car from Dollar. We were in the queue to pick up the car for almost 3 hours (a Sunday night). The situation looked very similar when I returned it, but thankfully the returns process was extremely quick.
I tried out FlightCar the last time I was in SFO for a conference. Basically lets you rent other people's cars while they were traveling. They pick you up in a black car to their lot and gave me a Toyota Camry with a GPS for $22 a day. Was quite impressed.
You can't at least choose a car category in the US? Here you don't know which exact model you'll have, but you know that it will be among a list of similar models of different brands, or a higher end model if none of them are available.
Also... what car rental company would ever buy orange cars? That seems completely stupid, I have never had a rental car that wasn't black or grey.
I don't know how car rental works in the US, but reading this article it sure looks quite broken compared to the places I have rented cars (France, Japan, Taiwan).
Car rental companies buy many cars from surplus dealer inventories, often towards the end of a model year. That's where they can get new reliable cars in bulk, and they don't care about color or particular models. So when you get an orange Aztek at the rental counter, that's because nobody bought it on the lot and Hertz scooped it up cheap.
I've been given an orange Dodge Nitro before. Most of the cars I've been given have been white, so much so I call the color "rental car white" and is the only color I exclude when looking for cars to purchase.
But yes, we can choose the category. And you will get it unless they are out of cars for that category. An orange Dodge Nitro was considered an "upgrade" from what I reserved. One time though I had reserved a Camry and they were out so they upgraded me to a Prius instead. It was nice driving the car back to the airport after a week of driving and not having to fill up the gas tank all week.
Sure you can choose your category. There's just no relying on it coming true when you arrive at the counter.
them-> "Here are the keys to your Dodge Durango"
you-> "no, actually I reserved a 4-door sedan"
them-> "I know sir but we don't have any left"
you-> "huh? I reserved one. what does a reservation mean?"
them-> "it's subject to availability sir"
In other words, (like many restaurants, like many airlines, hotels, etc), you can "reserve" anything you like, it doesn't mean it has been set aside for you.
Same thought. That car has so much cargo space that I was once able to move apartments without renting a van thanks to the oversized, unobstructed trunk on the PT. Also drove down highway 1, have nothing but good things to say about it.
Clearly this is totally subjective, but I just absolutely hate them. I hate the way they look, I hate sitting in them, and I feel so lame when I'm driving one. I would drive almost any other car before I would drive a PT Cruiser.
If you like them more power to you! I won't throw eggs at it or anything, promise. :) I would just never choose one for myself.
To reserve a car you like only to be given the car you despise is... disappointing.
It looks very retro and very American. However, the main reason for my question is that I rarely drive cars these days. I use mostly public transport and sometimes car sharing … when I rent a car in the US, usually a mid-size or standard car, I am always impressed by the size and the efficient A/C … ;)
this is crazy! It's not even that much of a premium! $12/day on weekends? I'd pay that just to get away from the horrible service I've gotten from the rental car industry, much less drive an Audi A4. (I'm not really all that car-crazy).
I think this appeals more to the business traveler than the budget conscious vacationer. In some places (detroit) rental cars are super cheap (sub $20/day).
I dig the model silvercar is trying to pulloff though. It is the jetblue of car rentals. Entire fleet is the same, lowers cost of maintenance (fewer spare parts, fewer training courses for mechanics, etc). They offer a premium reliable product at a fair price.
Now if only they would hook up with founderscard and setup a deal for its members...
> It is the jetblue of car rentals. Entire fleet is the same
I think a closer analogue is Southwest Airlines.
JetBlue actually operate two distinct families of aircraft, neither compatible to _any_ degree. The EMBRAER EMB-180 and the Airbus 320 / 321 series.
No spares compatibility and no pilot rating across those two types. Even the seats are different widths. The only common factor is that they both burn kerosene :)
JetBlue have also introduced a second cabin product, Mint, which further complicates their operations.
Before others get knickers in a twist: it's the E190. Also I think they only have one A321 so far, and I don't know enough to make a statement about part / training compatibility between the A320s and the A321 line.
Also, JetBlue already has two cabin products - the "Even More" seats, which you can book for an extra price, and give you additional legroom comparable to an exit seat, along with boarding first and a special security line with a smaller wait. On the A320 I flew a few weeks ago, the exit rows as well as the first 5 rows in the cabin were premium seats. So now you add in Mint and you basically have three classes of seats on JetBlue
As this is becoming a car rental review, I'll point that if you travel to Spain NEVER rent from Goldcar. They are a scam, prices go as low as 15€/day but when you get to pickup the car they fight with you to take the insurance (the original insurance is only covers third party damage). Also they insist that you return the car with the gas tank empty the. They charge you 120€ to fill a small car. The cars are far from new, you have to wait long cues...
Now I usually rent with sixt, they offer better price than Avis and Hertz and the cars and service are top notch. At least by the moment.
Couldn't you just counter this by not taking the insurance and returning the car with a full tank? What are they going to do, empty it and then charge you again to fill it up?
How will they lay blame to a damaged vehicle? Car rental companies have become viciously aggressive at forcing customers to take responsibility for damage, and it falls on the last guy to drive it. I'm embroiled in a false claim with Enterprise now.
Better buy the supplemental insurance if you don't want this monkey on your back.
I think the aggressiveness depends on the particular location. In the last year I've rented cars in Richmond, BC and Honolulu, and in both locations they were super laid-back about little dings and scrapes, even one scrape that I knew damn well that I put in it while wedging myself into a tiny spot in a parking garage.
I came right out and told them about it when I returned the car, they looked at it and said "No biggie. We'll let you know if it's going to cost anything to repair." Then I spent the next four days worrying they were going to charge my credit card $300 to fix a tiny scrape, but they called me on the fourth day and said that they weren't going to charge me a cent.
If you have travel insurance and most people do be sure to check if it covers rental cars as this is often a far cheaper option and already included so no point paying for insurance twice.
I'm all about skipping lines when renting cars, so I like this idea. I have Avis preferred through work and at most airports I just get on the Avis shuttle, they ask my name, and drop me right in front of the car - no lines or signatures required.
At SFO I rode the train out, once stood in line for 45 minutes to get a car, went down and found the car in the space wasn't the car I was supposed to get (and the key didn't work), waited in line another 45 minutes, then got in the car to find out that it wanted an oil change, got a cell phone call from the police because my wife (who threw up twice on the plane) didn't know what happened to me, and then I remembered that I forgot to get a child seat in all the confusion for my two year old.
I drove the car perhaps 1000 miles in the next week, down to San Luis Obispo and out to the Sierra Nevada and around the Central Coast region. I never changed the oil (I was too traumatized to want to call Hertz.) This is why you don't want to buy a used rental car. On the way back we had some trouble with the brakes but we got back alive.
At LAX on the other hand, I got a ride on a shuttle bus to Hertz, spent about 5 minutes in line and drove out with a decent car.
(The mistake we made there was thinking we could drive north on the 405 at 5pm on a Friday, I really should have driven up La Cienga, but I can't blame Hertz for that.)