Originally Posted by
cordelli
I'm not sure what you are thinking should have been different.
If they were out of cars then you need to wait for the next one to be available. It's not really that unusual for them to be out of cars from time to time, there are dozens of threads about it at various locations.
Did you expect them to give you the Mercedes or the Ferrari for whatever class you rented?
I most certainly would expect that (at least from Hertz-class companies), and have seen it happen many many times before. Happens all the time when they're out of compacts or midsize and put me in an intermediate or fullsize (sometimes an SUV). If that's what they have, it's what they have.
From what I've seen:
"First Tier" rental companies almost always do this without any issue.
"Second Tier" companies (e.g. Enterprise) first try to upsell you ("Sir, the compact really isn't very comfortable; are you sure you wouldn't like a midsize for just $5 more per day?"), then when you decline you find that all they have is the midsized car anyway and you get it for your compact price.
"Third Tier" companies (I saw this at Payless in PHX) will try to upsell, then if you decline make you wait until the class you reserved is ready, whenever that might be:
Incidentally, after waiting in line for 20 minutes while they pulled this on all 4 customers that got served in front of me (different car classes, so I think it was a standard "punishment" for not upgrading), I left the line and called Hertz, which had been sold out when I booked the trip a few days earlier, and they reserved me a compact car (which my company requires) on the phone. When I got to the garage, a few seconds of of hemming and hawing behind the counter, and I was sent to a spot with a Nissan 350Z...for the Compact rate.
Sounds like the MIA Hertz folks don't know whether they want to be first or third tier...