Originally Posted by
lettezilla
Rental agent gave me a big song and dance about how Alaska is “different from the rest of the States” and my policy wouldn’t work “because Alaska is a no-fault state” and therefore if I had no deductible (which was the case with this policy) they “would have nothing to go after and would have to sue me for the entire cost of the damage/theft.” She gave me the very hard sell on paying for their additional insurance.
I declined and re-read my policy document but didn’t see any exclusions for AK, and also seemed to find that AK isn’t in fact a no-fault state. So was she just trying to scam me? I searched for all sorts of variations about this and haven't found anything else, so was genuinely curious.
Ugh, this frustrates me. Before I left the state of Alaska, I thought I had finally done a good job of educating the Enterprise staff that Alaska is NOT a no-fault state. (One absolutely couldn't believe me when I showed him the law, and he almost teared up as he realized he'd been unintentionally misleading customers for the previous several months.)
The downside with Enterprise is that they move their staff around so much that there is no such thing as institutional knowledge. So, it appears that my efforts were in vain, and a new crop of temp workers brought up from Seattle for the summer got wind of the rumor that Alaska is a no-fault state and are running with it. It's sad, actually.
Alaska is NOT a no-fault state and you did everything you needed to perfectly.
I have used Enterprise on airport and at E Intl Airport locations and neither has given me a hard sell. But I know what other coverage I have and am polite but persistent.
Good for you for stsnding your ground. The rental agents apparently get a huge commission for upsells and that prompts them to be unethical sometimes.
It's a different branch manager each year you come up. Remember what I said about no institutional knowledge.
Some managers are better than others about managing the sales tactics used by their employees.
Also, Enterprise sales agents do not make huge commissions (unlike at most other rental agencies). The entry-level Management Trainees and second-level Management Assistants are entered into a contest each month where they can win a small amount ($100 cash and maybe dinner at a nice restaurant with their manager) but nothing further--except the carrot dangled in front of them, which is that they are told that their success at climbing the career ladder is closely tied to their sales performance numbers. The higher-level Assistant Managers and the top dog Branch Manager do receive a bonus based on overall profitability of the branch, and while they are incentivized to maximize sales to help their profits appear strong, they are also penalized if customer service scores drop too low (I believe they lose their entire bonus if their satisfaction quotient drops below 85%, which can leave them at near poverty-level wages).
For comparison purposes, a good rental agent at a competing company can make a solid $10-12 per hour plus a monthly sales bonus of $5000 or more (I've seen some great agents push upwards of $7-8,000 per month in sales bonus on top of base wage).