Avis is way better than Hertz at SJC. When the rental facility moved from the airport to off-site, it was pure hell with the buses. But Hertz couldn't get their Gold board working for months. There was always a huge line of Hertz Gold customers each time I arrived, so I started walking over to the Avis desk and they are great.

I always get an upgrade to a Caddy at SJC, but they do have some SUV's there.

Now with the dot.com kids leaving town, things aren't so bad at SJC anymore. But if I were returning a car on Thursday or Friday afternoon, I would definitely allow for an extra 30-40 minutes.