Hertz - Is my rental guaranteed to be there?

Hi folks,

I frequent the frequent flier forums on FT a lot, but I'm a rental car newbie as I rarely rent (I use Zipcar locally). Even so, I'm Hertz Gold, as a perk of my Amex Platinum. I have a reservation at a local Hertz (not an airport) for Memorial Day Weekend. Got a good rate. I've gotten to car rental places in the past when, despite having a reservation, they had no car for me. I'm concerned something like this may happen on a busy holiday weekend. Is it possible or will they definitely be saving me a car?

Any thoughts to calm my nerves would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks :)

Unfortunately nothing is guaranteed. However, I think the chances of you not getting a car at all are very low. If I were betting I would say your worst case scenario would be you have to wait 30 minutes for a car.

I wouldn't worry about it too much. Holiday weekends are easy to plan for since all of the rentals are for leisure and usually planned well in advance like yourself.

Thanks for the response. The rental is at 9:30am at the 10th Street location in San Francisco, if that's any help. I suppose me being Gold doesn't help with a guarantee, huh?

Never could quite understand how the reservation thing works - I always thought a reservation meant you would have it when you got there, but car rental companies seem to defy logic.

Is it excessive to book another reservation elsewhere as a backup?

Well you just answered why they don't have cars sometimes (in part). Because they know a good amount of their reservations are backups, and they know they don't need a car for every reservation they have, as some of those won't show up.

It's nothing new, every aspect of travel overbooks. Airlines do it, hotels do it, cruises do it, they take more reservations then they have product, they know statistics show them not everybody will show up.

There are many other reasons, people hold on to a car longer, they break down, etc. I've been lucky in that I've had to wait 20 minutes or so a few times while they cleaned a car up, but they have always had a car for me.

It's nothing new, every aspect of travel overbooks. Airlines do it, hotels do it, cruises do it, they take more reservations then they have product, they know statistics show them not everybody will show up.


The no show rates with rental cars are even higher since 99% of reservations carry no penalty to not show up.

My problem with Hertz is that they seem to make no distinction between pre-paid rentals (which I almost always make, as in the UK they are significantly cheaper) and pay on arrival. With a pay on arrival rental, as spades097 says, there is no penalty for no-shows. With a pre-paid rental, they have taken my money and if I don't show, they keep it. For that, i expect that when I do show, there should be THE car I booked there 100% of the time. Hertz have taken my money, and by doing so they have made a committment to deliver the goods. Sadly, this does not always happen.

Until Rental companies adopt penalties for ALL rentals, the no-show rates will continue to hit double digits, thus creating overbooking situations.

While not applying to Hertz, this did bring back memories of the Doubletree viral "Yours is a very bad hotel" powerpoint.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/6667486/Yours-is-a-Very-Bad-Hotel

I've rented from that location a few times (10th and Geary) and have never had any issues with no cars. The downtown locations share fleet with eachother (and with SFO) so they go get cars elsewhere when they need them. They know you are coming, they'll have a car for you. I think reserving a backup is excessive.

That said, I've never gotten great cars at this location -- no upgrades and standard cars in the reserved class -- but you'll have a car for your trip. Do report back and let us know how it goes.

My problem with Hertz is that they seem to make no distinction between pre-paid rentals (which I almost always make, as in the UK they are significantly cheaper) and pay on arrival. With a pay on arrival rental, as spades097 says, there is no penalty for no-shows. With a pre-paid rental, they have taken my money and if I don't show, they keep it. For that, i expect that when I do show, there should be THE car I booked there 100% of the time. Hertz have taken my money, and by doing so they have made a committment to deliver the goods. Sadly, this does not always happen.


Well I hope they are compensating you when there is a delay getting your pre-paid rental. As someone already stated, they do it just likes airlines do it. You reserve a specific seat when you book an airline ticket. The airline will always overbook and will overbook at the last minute if they have the opportunity to do so. If there is a person at the counter willing to pay 10-20x more than the lowest fare then they will gladly accept it and find someone on the plane that is willing to take a later flight for a $200 certificate.

Mike, that was a great presentation. I had nearly the same thing happen in Houston of all places at a Hampton Inn. At 3am in the rain they made me wait outside for security reasons since they couldn't find my name in the system (you know every theif is dressed in a suit has two bags of luggage and comes to rob a Hampton Inn)
The system had canceled my reservation at midnight even though I had a late arrival CC and a note in my reservation indicating I had a very late arrival. The manager was quite responsive the next morning when I informed him of the trouble.

I've been Hertz Gold for years and I always got my car and frequently an upgrade. I prepaid for the first time last week and again I had no problems. None in Italy, or Antigua (but that wasn't the best car I ever had from them, but it served the purpose):D

I've rented from that location a few times (10th and Geary) and have never had any issues with no cars. The downtown locations share fleet with eachother (and with SFO) so they go get cars elsewhere when they need them. They know you are coming, they'll have a car for you. I think reserving a backup is excessive.

Cool. I am actually renting from 10th St and Howard, but I imagine it's the same story. This makes me feel better :)

That said, I've never gotten great cars at this location -- no upgrades and standard cars in the reserved class -- but you'll have a car for your trip. Do report back and let us know how it goes.

Will do!