IBM/Hertz Corporate program - automatic Club Gold?

Trying to steer a friend through Hertz status levels. He works at IBM. Does anyone know if the Hertz/IBM corporate prog automatically entitle employees to Club Gold?

Yes. It should be posted somewhere on their W3 intranet. Usually a link to a Hertz form that has IBM's CDP number.

thanks. aforementioned friend is generally disinterested in points, status. but moans about the hassles of picking up. let me try to motivate him to search the w3.ibm.com sites. i am sure they should have a link some place inside.

Yes, Hertz commonly gives complementary #1 Gold in corporate agreements. IBM rents about 27% of the entire Hertz fleet and has a corporate agreement. In some cases IBM employees can park in a Hertz lot at the airport.

Go to http://w3.ibm.com/travel and click on the Car Rental link. Underneath that on the same toolbar, you'll see a "Hertz Gold Card Application" link which you use to go to the IBM-only site to sign up.

IBM doesn't allow ZE1 points earning, however. Hertz says it's something to do with IBM's privacy-policy, but I have a feeling it's more because the rates we get are so good that it was negotiated into our contract (since nobody has a probloem with us earning hotel points or airline miles).

An earlier thread about the IBM contract had a post where someone described a way to get around this, but involves signing up for #1 Gold on your own (and either paying the fee, or using some other way to waive it) and then adding the IBM CDP later on. You can't use the link on w3 for this, of course.

Wow, I knew we were one of Hertz's larger contracts, but didn't really know it was that much. Is IBM Hertz's largest customer?

I still remember the days last year when we had ridiculously low corporate refueling rates that were only negotiated annually. During the summer, it was $3.19 for 87 octane in SFO, and I would turn in empty cars for the IBM rate of $2.20. Of course, starting this year, the refueling rate is negotiated monthly...

That'd be me in this thread - http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=627032

prashok - very useful. from my time as an IBMer, i was guessing that the site would be some place under w3.ibm.com. i never had a need to travel, so never bothered. it was also before i converted to FT. i have passed on the info to the friend. let me try and prod him to get over inertia and actually use it.

the lower rates make up for the lack of ze1 pts, imho.

I have a family member that works for Hertz, and that was the number a couple of years ago. I have no idea if IBM is the largest customer or not.