National - No Show

I have a booking at PHL that I might not use. If I am not remembering wrong, I did not provide a CC bunber at the time of reservation. I have no emerald club or other affililations. What happends if I dont pick up the car. Will they just cancel it or will they blacklist my e mail or something like that.

I would call and let them know just in case somebody else needs it, but in general, unless it's a prepaid rate, they will not do anything.

I have a booking at PHL that I might not use. If I am not remembering wrong, I did not provide a CC bunber at the time of reservation. I have no emerald club or other affililations. What happends if I dont pick up the car. Will they just cancel it or will they blacklist my e mail or something like that.

Cancel it, either by calling or doing it on line. There will be no penalty but as a courtesy, you should cancel it (even if its past the pick up time).

I stand corrected, National has a policy to charge for certain rentals, I have no clue if they actually charge or not, just saw this:

In the case of a "no show" of a customer, the reservation will be canceled. National charges a fee on the renters credit card for vehicles that are reserved but not rented, if the reservation was not canceled within 24 hours of the anticipated arrival.

Cancellations are accepted up to one calendar day before reservation date. If the reservation is not cancelled, a No Show Fee of $50.00 (plus applicable taxes, surcharges, and lessor fees) will be charged to the credit card on the Guaranteed Reservation.

Guaranteed Reservations are required on all specialty vehicles, such as minivan, 4-wheel drive, and convertible car classes at all Corporate locations and at participating licensee locations.

I've seen guaranteed reservations before. If you're not in Emerald Club the reservation screen will very specifically ask you to provide a credit card number before booking and will say "Your CC is required to confirm this vehicle".

As long as you didn't see that, you wouldn't be charged a no-show fee nor a fee for canceling with less than 24 hours notice.

I too advocate cancelling when you don't need a car, however last time I had to I went to the customer service booth at National SEA. The girl told me she wouldn't bother since the res would just "cancel itself". So if anybody was denied a car in SEA recently, blame her not me! :p

Thanks for the input. I was good and cancelled it. I was a little worried about getting one of those dreadful Town Cars at Avis, and that's why I wanted to keep it as a backup. I would do an Maxima before TC any day. But now I will just have ot hope Avis comes through;)