Hertz - weekend rental then return late for extra day charge

I am trying to find a decent rate on a rental out of phx that starts sat morning and ends on a Tuesday. Unfortunately, I need the car past the weekend rental cutoff of 11:59 pm and when I price out a impala (reg. full size) with the $25 off AAA weekend coupon, it comes to $268. Yikes. When I price out sat morning through monday night (three weekend days), it comes out as $130 - the difference is not only the extra day at full mid-week price, but they weekend rate increases AND the system is charging me for TWO weekdays and TWO weekend days when I keep the car for just 12 more hours. Paying almost $140 for 15 hours is not cool with me so I see two options:

A) Book the three day weekend at $130, return car to airport monday and buy another day or use 500 points for a free day (ends up at $18 with fees). Obviously this is a pain because I plan to be golfing and at spring training, but do-able. I could also use the HLE at the hotel to do the return, but the one way means no coupon, and the hours HLE are open are limited.

B) Book the weekend rate at $130, then just return the car a day late and pay the 'extra day' charge listed on the rental agreement. My question is whether this would cause my entire rate to recalculate back to the original quote of $290, whether it would invalidate my coupon, or whether it would just add the $64.99 + tax (or whatever that rate my be) to my original quote of $130.

Does anyone have experience with keeping an car an extra day weekday on the weekend rate? Thanks for the help!

Your best option is A if you want to save the bucks. A weekend rate ends on Monday and if you keep it beyond that the WHOLE RATE converts to a daily or weekly rate depending on how long you keep it. When the contract prints for your weekend rate it won't list an extra day charge just an extra hour charge since your return is on the last possible weekend day.

One option that has worked for me is to explain at pickup you have an additional reservation to the manager and it would be a huge hassle to return and recheck the same vehicle so can you close and open by phone on Monday. Of course, you would have to be a good salesman and find the right manager but it's worth a try.

Aaahhh...the Saturday- (or Friday-) Tuesday rental. Honestly, this is a decent one for Priceline if a mix of cost and convenience is important. You won't earn your ZE1 points by doing it that way, but you'll probably get your car at a good price and not have to car-swap.

Note that taxes are brutal at PHX, so every dollar you can save on your base rate is really saving you about $1.70 - if not more. I've had PHX rentals up over 100% taxes in the past.

I'm not a huge Priceline fan by any stretch, but I do use 'em on the Sat-Tue 4 day rentals often. Four and five day rentals are in their sweet spot because 4's charge at four high daily rates and 5's charge as weeklies. Once Priceline assigns your rental car, make sure you have that agency's expedited-renter card on you and go directly to the expedited booth - don't stand in the "regular" line.

Oh, and if you have a bunch of guys with golf clubs, Dollar has a good van special going. No, vans won't earn you any "cool points", but they'll haul four guys and their sticks without any trouble. We've booked 'em in Myrtle for golf trips before...

Thanks for the info. Good to know I can't just extend a weekend rate. I played around with returning the car at the HLE at my hotel (sidenote - gotta love the Marriott B1G1 coupon + the free night for premier visa rewards card at the $300/nt scottsdale old town) and found returning the car sunday morning and re-renting would save me about $90 - even though no coupons are valid on the one way. Not playing golf on Sunday because I am on vacation and there is no way I want to put up with slow weekend golf. That's bad enough at home.

I played around with returning the car at the HLE at my hotel (sidenote - gotta love the Marriott B1G1 coupon + the free night for premier visa rewards card at the $300/nt scottsdale old town) and found returning the car sunday morning and re-renting would save me about $90 - even though no coupons are valid on the one way.Here is another "good salesman tactic": I have been successful booking a same location return and then at the time of rental being granted a same city different location drop off without it being officially reclassified as a one-way, therefore still being eligible for promos that exclude one-ways. Could be worth a try.

And FWIW, I concur that extending a weekend rental beyond the Monday midnight deadline does indeed void the weekend promos.

Same is true for picking up Sunday morning: you can reserve for weekend pickup up to 11:59am on Sunday, but at Noon Sunday you turn into a weekday pumpkin. So if you are a bit late, you have to convince the rep to set back the time to 11:59am. Most reps understand this and grant it if you explain it and aren't a jerk, but few understand it offhand.