Hertz and Airtran
 

Would like to have your take on this:

Up to now, I usually plugged my FF number whenever I was making a reservation with any car rental company. After all, it was usually about 75 cents per day to get 0.5 A+ credit (or 1.5 A+ credit with the 3x promo).

With other airlines, we were looking at 75 cents for between 50 and 100 miles per day (provided no promo). Not great but that is fine.

Last week-end I rented a Hertz car for 6 days. Without the 3x promo, this earns just a single A+ credit. But, I was astounded by the FF administrative fee charge that they billed me upon returning the car: $5.25

I think this is borderline outrageous for an administrative fee. Seriously, $5.25 just to plug a number in a blank cell (which incidentally I did myself while reserving!). They should stop calling that administrative fee or tax recoupment because I am not sure this is really true at this stage.

Still, it is a good value for Airtran points which I value at $13-$16 per points but this is nowhere earning "free miles/points when renting a car"

Do you guys still credit airlines FF miles to your car rentals or are you guys using the car rental companies own frequent renter programs?

Minos

I do the math generally and on rare occasions will take Hertz points. I use a pretty mathematical approach and value Hertz points at $.08 each.

For my part, I value an Airtran credit at $18.90 but feel that's maybe just a bit high so 1.5 credits amounts to a $28.35 rebate.

Unless I have an unexpectedly high cost rental and no promo such as 3x Hertz that I can apply, I choose FF miles despite the costs.