June 12, 2006

Rental Car$.

Filed under: Uncategorized — Jim @ 9:28 pm

I had occasion to dig out my bill for the seven-passenger minivan I rented to use for the week while in Fort Myers Beach last month. Clearly, I don’t pay nearly enough attention to the details.

Sure, I had signed all that stuff (i.e. the charges) when I picked up the car at the airport. Excited about being away and in a rush to get underway, I didn’t pay all that much attention to what the woman behind the counter was saying, and when all the papers were done, I placed them over the visor until it was time to turn the car in, at which time I hurriedly stuffed them into a carry-on. Once home, they were tucked away with e-tickets, boarding passes, brochures, and the usual detritus one accumulates when traveling.

Only now, I actually read the bill. Holy crap! The “additional charges” and other stuff brought the price for the week from $161 to $388! Some of this, as you shall see, was the result of the Rental Car Company’s venality (in my opinion), combined with my lack of paying proper attention.

Here’s the story.

The “Basic Rate”
Several weeks before the trip, I used priceline.com and placed a bid for a seven-passenger minivan. My bid of $23.00 per day was accepted. So, to get a feel for what the van would cost, I multiplied $23.00 times 7 days, which turns out to be $161.00. Seemed pretty reasonable to me, given that simply going to the rental car website and making the same deal (I checked today to be sure) would cost $512.00!. The information on Priceline properly advises that there will be “additional charges” that will have to be paid to the rental car company. I figured that the “additional charges” would amount to a few bucks. I did not figure that the “additional charges” would be $140% of the base rate.

The “Additional Charges”
Here’s the breakdown:

$ 69.93 ($9.99 per day x 7 days) for “CDW”
$ 73.75 Fuel Service Option
$ 56.00 Additional Driver
$ 22.18 “Concession Recoupment Fee”
$ 04.69 Sales tax

$226.56 TOTAL (in addition to the $161.00 “base rate”)

WTF?
NOTE: I declined all the insurance gimmicks, so none of the following includes any of that.

CDW
Christ only knows what “CDW” is, but I paid almost seventy bucks for it.

Fuel Service Charge
This bit of douchebaggery was my own fault. The “sell” is, “Pay for the fuel up front, and bring it back empty. Don’t worry about filling up.” As I said above, I was in a rush, and I didn’t do the mental calculus I should have done. As such, I ended up using only about a half tank of gas, for which I paid $73.75. Knucklehead!!!

Hell, even if I had used ALL the gas, I figure it would have cost me, at most, $54.00 to fill the tank (18 gallons at $3.00 per gallon). Instead, I paid $73.00 for about $20.00 worth of gas.

The moral of the story is that, unless the airport is more than 15 miles away from the nearest gas station, tell the rental car people to shove their “Fuel Service”.

Additional Driver
It cost $8.00 per day ($56.00 for the week) for Mrs. Parkway to be allowed to drive the van. As it turns out, she never needed to drive the damned thing, but I know I would be up Shits Creek if I had not paid the charge and she had driven the car and gotten into an accident.

I seem to recall that one of the other rental companies does not charge extra if the “additional driver” is a spouse over 25. In my view, that ought to be the standard practice, but obviously it is not.

Concession Recoupment Fee
I have no goddamned idea what this is, but somebody or something ended up with $22.18.

Sales Tax
This one I understand, and, at 4% it is a bargain. In Jersey, it would have been 6% and quite possibly 7% if our new governor has his way.

Summing Up
1. Use priceline.com. If you are certain of your dates and times, use priceline.com. I say this, because, once your bid is accepted by Priceline, that’s it. There are no changes permitted. As noted above the difference in cost was $161.00, via Priceline, as compared to $512.00 directly from the rental company.

2. “Fuel Service” DON’T BUY IT. Even if you were to smoke up the entire tank of gas to “return it empty” you’ll still pay way too much. Fill it up near the airport instead.

3. Additional Driver Here’s a dilemma. You could search out a rental company that does not charge for a spouse as the additional driver, but that rules out using Priceline.com, because with Priceline, you get whatever national rental company accepts your bid.

4. CDW If anyone knows what the hell “CDW” or the “Concession Recoupment Fee” is, please let me know.

11 Comments »

  1. Collision Damage Waiver. Supposedly a good/important thing to get for a “short term” rental. I believe everything I look up on the internet in under 45 seconds. And so should you.

    Comment by dogette — June 12, 2006 @ 11:45 pm

  2. Ah, Collision Damage Waiver. I remember now. That’s the deal where you are completely off the hook for accidental damage done to the car, essentially covering the “deductable” (i.e. the piece you pay) under your own auto insurance.

    Thankee.

    Comment by Jim — June 13, 2006 @ 4:32 am

  3. As I understand it, CDW is like collision insurance, except you’re not buying anything from an insurance company. You’re paying the car rental people to not hassle you over damage to the car. The reputable ones have a place on he original contract where you initial whether you’re buying this or not.

    Comment by Jack Bog — June 13, 2006 @ 4:32 am

  4. CDW – well, the good folks above have explained it to you. They can’t call it “insurance” because car rental companies are not licensed to sell insurance. But if it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck…you get the picture.

    CDW is like auto insurance – thta you’re paying $8,000 a year for. It’s a rip-off, but many people buy it for peace of mind. Yeef.

    Concession Recoupment Fee – you’re paying the fee that the airport charges the rental car company for allowing them to operate there.

    I know that in places like Houston – and almost everywhere else – you will also be paying a boatload of miscellaneous taxes…taxes that are levied on Traveler’s Services like rental cars and (to a lesser extent) hotel rooms. Who do you think is paying to build all them nice new stadiums? Out-of-towners who don’t get to vote against the taxes they’ll get stuck with. It’s a dirty political trick, but a lot of places use it. The taxes can easily be 40% of your bill.

    I rent cars all the time. I’m used to these scams – but I don’t like ’em.

    Comment by Elisson — June 13, 2006 @ 6:38 am

  5. How does it feel to get fucked without KY Jelly?

    Comment by Catfish — June 13, 2006 @ 10:29 am

  6. Yeah, I never take the fuel deal. They will always get you with that.

    As for the CDW – depends, sometimes I take it, sometimes no. Darling Daughter used to work for a car rental company. That’s “insurance” but what happens is, if you damage the car – the repair bill comes off the profit for that particular branch you rented from… at least where she worked. You may think you get screwed on the deal – but she got hit even worse. (you only rent a car occasionally, she worked there for 2 years)

    She worked with the promise of commission – but never received any at all, because the CDW’s ate up all the “profits”. (one week she had 3 people total cars in accidents who were covered by these things) So, even though her branch was doing record business – she was making a pitiful amount of money and working 80 hours a week. It’s a lose-lose-lose for everyone but the top people in the rental company – somehow they manage to make terrific profits and live well. Amazing how that works.

    That Concession Recoupment Fee – that’s the one that looks completely and totally bogus.

    Comment by Teresa — June 13, 2006 @ 11:47 am

  7. Yep, they will get you if they can. Some years ago sweetthing picked up the rental Towncar while I was getting the luggage at the DFW Texas Fiasco of an airport. When I turned the car in a week later the 300 dollar bill was suddenly over 700 bucks..sweetthing had checked the damn insurance blocks. She learned but it sure cost a bundle for the lesson.

    Comment by GUYK — June 13, 2006 @ 7:16 pm

  8. You think that’s bad, try extending your rental period for another three days. I decided to do that in the Keys once and the bill was already high, around $350 bucks for ten days because I bought the insurance waivers, being nervous driving in Florida for the first time. With the penalites and the additional charges, I ended paying around $750 bucks. I was pretty peeved when I got home too but I didn’t pay attention at the time either. I didn’t care, I changed my intinerary cause the weather finally broke and the semi-wild manatees showed up at the dock.

    Comment by Libby — June 13, 2006 @ 8:46 pm

  9. Jimbo,

    Little known but important fact is that most major credit card companies cover the CDW if
    you use their credit card. I checked with my Visa card company (bank) and they verified
    that if I use their card for a rental, they automatically cover the CDW.

    Since I don’t have any auto insurance coverage (sold my cars before moving to Japan) I
    had to look up all the “required” coverages to get when Im back in the States on vaction.
    The CDW coverage by Visa is great but the rental companies will never tell you about it.
    I read some article in some travel magazine that gave me the straight skinny.

    Comment by Dan — June 13, 2006 @ 9:38 pm

  10. Jim, most personal auto policies will cover any damage to (or caused by) a car you rent temporarily, up to the limits of your own policy, as long as you’re not using it for business. I assume you’ve got comp and collision on the big fat capitalist car, so you probably don’t need to purchase the CDW at all. In most cases, all it does is cover your policy’s deductible, which presumably, you’re willing to eat anyway.

    Comment by Shamrock — June 15, 2006 @ 7:43 pm

  11. Hit a deer with a rental car (small deer, so not totalled). I’d rented the car using my AMEX card, which covered the deductable on my regular policy. My total cost for the accident were a few phone calls and some stamps to mail in forms.

    Be sure to check on all of the “travel benefits” of your credit cards…..some include CDW coverage, others don’t. And be sure not to use the ones that don’t provide coverage!!

    Comment by Curmudgeon — June 20, 2006 @ 2:30 am

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