Originally Posted by p1cunnin
What I've found is that the "majors" (Hertz, Avis, National) tend not to be as picky about dings. The "tourist" rental car agencies tend to go over the car with a fine tooth comb and point out every scratch.
As the above and other posters have pointed out, if you stick with the above "big three" rental agencies, you'll almost certainly have a no hassle experience. And, you don't have to spend the extra time going over the car with a fine-toothed comb every time you rent just to avoid being ripped off.
And the amazing thing is, they're usually only a few dollars more than the "discount" chains. Paying 3 or 4 dollars more a day is more than worth the ease of rental and peace of mind, in my opinion and experience.
Speaking of the fine print in rental agreements, I found out the hard way (or was I just reminded) why I don't like to rent from the budget places, in this case Enterprise. There was minor damage done to the rental car during my rental, so I had to fill out their claim form when I returned it. Fine, I thought, as I had rented it with Diners Club, so that provided me primary coverage. The next day, I got a call from my regular auto insurance company, wanting details in order to process a claim. "What??!!" was more or less my reaction. Enterprise, without my knowledge or permission, had contacted my regular insurance company and opened a claim. Of course, they are able to do this because they make you show a copy of your insurance card and photocopy it before the rental (at least for local rentals), so they have all of the information.
I called their claims person, and he told me to read the rental agreement. It turns out that everyone renting a car from Enterprise (at least in Texas) is actually granting them a Limited Power of Attorney (!) to handle such matters on your behalf. To say the least, I was stunned. I could barely believe that a routine retail consumer transaction would contain a Power of Attorney clause in the fine print.
Since I have the frequent renter Master Agreement card with Avis and National, I took a look at those agreements, and they don't have Power of Attorney clauses in them, so it's not as if it's standard practice in the industry.
And of course, once your insurance company finds out about something like this, they want to use it as an excuse to raise your rates, even if the claim gets paid by someone else.