[CSMastermind]

I travel quite a bit for both business and personal reasons.

This means I'm driving a rental car for 100+ days a year.

I've tried all the major rental brands and Hertz is a terrible experience even when they're not calling the police on you by mistake. Their systems don't work quite right, there's a bunch of hidden fees, and their customer service is lacking at best.

I swear by Enterprise and purchasing the extra insurance to cover any damages. They've done right by me as a customer across many different cities and locations.

I know that some people are always going to just buy whatever is the cheapest or whatever deal gets them the most points with credit card or whatever. And that seems to be where Hertz makes their money.

But for anyone willing to pay a little more for a good experience and less stress Enterprise is my recommendation.

[LanceH]

The last 3 years I've had occasion to use Budget on an "I need a rental now" basis.

I've had a good experience because they just don't seem to care. That is, the employees working there just check in/out, sign the paperwork, that's it. I haven't had to spend a lot of time turning down questionable options and upgrades. There haven't been turn-in inspections where they claim that tiny scratch on the car with 160k miles is my fault.

They just seem to get me checked in so they can get back to their phone. It's not a premium experience by any means, but it's simple.

[SOLAR_FIELDS]

FWIW I use Avis (same company, higher price tier) and also have zero of those kind of issues.

[throw8383833jj]

I once chose hertz because it was cheapest and I regretted it! They didn't specify how much the baby seat was going to be and it end up being like 20$ extra! they should have mentioned how much the baby seat costs on the checkout page. and then when i complained about it, they just wanted to blame the 3rd party checkout processor. Hertz, never again!

In life, i've learned, that if an optional extra price isn't listed for that option, don't select it. and if you really need that option and the price isn't there, just hit the back button and don't use that service ever again.

[jimmydddd]

re: "because it was the cheapest" I use Budget and I haven't had any problems. However, I always thought Hertz and Avis were the expensive premium rental places. So I learned something today.

[SOLAR_FIELDS]

Avis is at least. They are the same company that owns Budget, but on the more premium price tier.

[jamies]

I have only rented with Hertz for about 20 years, and finally gave about after almost several bad experiences. Tried Enterprise on my first trip last week and was shocked at how much better it is.

[RocketOne]

I dont rent often but definitely go with Enterprise when I do. They are the only one left in my city that offers unlimited mileage and my typical trip is 1800 km round trip so it matters.

Last trip Enterprise was fully booked so I did try Budget. Their office is so small that you actually have to arrive at our local airport and THEN call the attendant who comes in from her house to book out your car. That took almost an hour.

The return process is even sillier. Write your mileage on a poorly photocopied slip of paper, and drop it on her desk with the keys. No pics. No checkout inspection, just 'trust us not to charge you extra'.

Fortunately I took a ton of pictures including the odometer so when they couldnt do math and tried to charge me an extra 1000 km, I fought back with pics and got those charges dropped. That's the last time I use Budget.

[Insanity]

I will +1 enterprise. Consistently had good customer experience with them.

[mi100hael]

+2, and National which is owned by Enterprise and allows you to just walk into the garage, get in a car, and drive out. It's the most painless process in the industry.

[jiveturkey]

Isn't that also exactly the Hertz experience? Has been for me. Of course it isn't literally drive out. Most airports you do have to stop at an exit booth and show your ID.

[LorenPechtel]

Enterprise, small rental office near home--took them an hour to locate the plates for the car after I complained about and refused to accept a car with expired temporary tags.

[za3faran]

> and purchasing the extra insurance to cover any damages.

Don't most credit cards provide rental insurance? How is their coverage different (if it is)?

[iso1631]

We have an Enterprise deal with work so we get very good rates, especially when they drop a car off and pick up at my home or office

However I was in one a few months ago and got a puncture on a dual carriageway. By the time I pulled over to a safe location the tyre was shredded. No problem, go into the boot to get the spare wheel out and I'll deal with it later.

There was no spare wheel. Just some little device which I assume is supposed to somehow re-inflate the tyre and seal any small holes for a small amount of time. Clearly not going to work when the side wall is shredded from driving the best part of a mile on it.

Too 6 hours for a tow-truck to arrive, pick me up, take me to a local garage, and change the tyre. That cost my employer far more than the cost of a spare wheel -- not to mention the cost of the tow itself being about the same price as the wheel + tyre.

Probably not a slight on Enterprise, as I'm sure it's the same with other hire companies (I hired from Sixt on holiday and it was the same). Why don't cars come with spare wheels any more? Are people really that incompetent they can't change one? Surely punctures as as common now as they were 20 years ago.

[sangnoir]

> Are people really that incompetent they can't change one?

I suspect they don't want people stealing/replacing spares in rentals with worn ones[0]. The mere possibility of this adds 1 more thing that has to be inspected and kept track of.

0. I once managed to run down the battery on a U-Haul by keeping the emergency blinkers on(!). I didn't have jumper cables and thought I'd hot-swap it with the one on my car to get it charged: which is how I discovered that batteries in U-Hauls cannot be easily removed. I ended up getting a tow truck to jump-start the U-Haul many hours later.

[kshacker]

I was shopping for a car/SUV recently and was given the story about tire technology changing and tires being so good they never fail :) wish I could remember the precise words but good discussion since I never bought the car due to supply chain issues and now I will remember to ask the details.

[brewdad]

I got a flat in my rental car last week. It ended up costing me about 3-4 hours out of my day to have a mobile tire guy dispatched from 40 miles away. No spare in the vehicle, so I had no choice but to wait.

I found it funny when I looked closer and realized that the tire that failed didn't match the other three. I think that particular wheel was cursed since the car only had 26k miles on it.

[twelve40]

tfa is about people _going to jail_. That is so absurd I can barely believe it. and here we are, discussing $20 child seats and missing spares... priorities...

[esalman]

I actually always book through Costco membership. Even then I try to book from Enterprise or budget and avoid Hertz.

[geoelectric]

Interestingly, I had Enterprise squarely in my head as the budget option compared to Hertz, who I always had down as the "pricey but better service" option (at least if you exercised the Gold program, etc.)

Not sure if I'm strictly a victim of effective marketing, or if they flipped places in the last however many years, or what, but it's interesting to see your post and the replies that imply I've got it backwards.

[CSMastermind]

If you formed that opinion years ago it might have been more true. In the 00s Hertz was indeed a top tier, best in class, rental company.

They were sold the private equity then taken public in 2006 and the quality of the company declined dramatically over the 2010s.

They changed their model to focus on partnership programs through airlines, hotels, and credit cards while offering low teaser rates for their rentals and upselling addons afterwards.

Performance metrics for their staff shifted from customer satisfaction to sales targets.

They canceled their R&D efforts (like rental kiosks) and refocused that money on marketing campaigns.

Their marketshare and profits declined and as a result activist investor Carl Icahn put pressure on the company to cut costs in 2016, forcing in a new CEO. Those cuts ultimately led to incidents like the one in the original article about falsely reporting the vehicles stolen but also to the company's bankruptcy filing in 2019.

It's been quite the fall from grace for the company.

[listenallyall]

Man, sometimes people are so desperate to advance a point of view, they end up a million miles off base. Carl Icahn didn't "force in" a new CEO, his old CEO was a freaking criminal who signed off on fraudulent earning reports. Yes, a change was warranted. He got paid over $10 million to walk, left Hertz with another $16 million in fines, and he himself ultimately settled with the SEC for just $2 million (and landed in the CEO role at Caesars Entertainment, which filed for bankruptcy under his watch, and then paid him $29 million to "emerge"). No, if you are a criminal CEO and a cheapskate, you don't get to blame Uncle Carl for making you do it.

https://www.sec.gov/news/press-release/2020-183

[geoelectric]

Sounds like it. I think the last time I used them was 2016ish or maybe even a year or two before, so that explains it.

[_8j50]

I have the opposite experience, tried a lot of things including Turo and Hertz economy is the best. I can rent without a credit card and with a deposit easily, cars are clean, never a flat tire or break down so far, good sat radio. What else is there?

[Overtonwindow]

I concur. I travel every month and Hertz was my GoTo for twenty years. The customer service is abysmal. Hertz..hurts.

[lrem]

Is that a US thing? I've been using both in Europe and Hertz seemed better, but also more expensive.