Hello

What is the margins to play with "country of residence" when renting with Avis?

I need to book in Rome, and the price difference is very significant from
1) USA (where I live, and cc bill address)
2) Belarus (citizen of),
3) Italy (i'm going to rent at train station in Rome)

After using D086533 (-30%!!!) code its like $412, $347 or $312 accordingly for Alfa Romeo 156 for a week.

So am I allowed to put whatever I want, cheat a little (submit country of citizenship instead of residence), or be honest? Can I have a problems with that?

The only way Avis can distinct my residence from citizenship is by my cc billing address.

Anybody has an experience with that?

Thanks

Could become a problem! I had it twice (with larger cars!) that the agent called a number to check the address. They also ask for 2 credit cards, when you rent a bigger car!

Sorry - double posting ...

Find the phone number of the favoured country of residence and phone them to book the car. They don't ask you where you live but they do want a contact phone number. Alternatively get a friend in the "correct" country to book the car for you.

Done it lots of times, it works well.

So I was looking at this for New Zealand later this year - quote on NZ web site was 50% lower than the charge quoted on UK web site when I entered New Zealand as country of residence.

I have several friends in NZ that I could use their tel number - no problem, but what happpens when you go to pick-up the car and they look at your licence & cc and they are clearly not from NZ ??

Neil

ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!

I did a rental back home in NZ a little while back, phoned NZ to book it and gave my sister's phone in NZ as a contact. Quote AWD D086533 for an extra discount. Don't forget that NZ are 11 hours ahead of BST when you call.

Enjoy your trip!

Excellent - that's the comment I wanted to here ! Will definately give it a try by calling them direct....oh yeah....must ask friend first if OK to use her phone number !! LOL

I have used the German website of Avis. It does not ask you for the country of residence, but for Manhattan it gives you half the price of the US site. I did enter my US Wizard number with my US address, no problem. Now one smart?!?!?? agent in Manhattan has told me I can not do it anymore, and actually put a note into my profile not to accept a booking for Manhattan on the German website. I am pretty upset about this. Not only do I have to pay now double, but I do not see what I did do wrong. If Avis can not control their own system, then this should really not be my problem. But I think I found the trick: I will book without the Wizard number. Then it asks you for your address, and even though I enter a US address I still save my 50% over these rip-off Manhattan prices - until the next "smart" agent comes up

Just returned from Australia, w/ two rentals at two different cities, both booked as an AU resident (U.S. resident rate was at 50-100% higher). Neither location said anything whatsoever. I think the vastly different pricing structures based simply upon nationality are an unethical scam to ripoff unknowledgable people.

Could some of those more versed in legalese than me explain how these policies differ from racism, or at least something approaching it? I always wondered about this in the past and am surprised I haven't seen it come up here on FT before.

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well, price discrimination is not racial discrimination. i personally have no problem with either though ... from people, or from companies. if people dont like me, it really is ok by me ... haha

I'm not sure what you mean by price discrimination, but basing rates on what country you're from is pretty close to racism and agism in nature. Let's call it "nationalism". As noted in the other thread this sort of thing is banned by the Treaty of Rome in the EU.

Having said that, I don't really want this rectified as what will likely happen is that each country will charge it's highest rate and those of us with the inclination to find work arounds will be out of luck.

Hi!

I tried using this to get a better price. Ok, I got the better price. However, now that I have received my bill, the price was much higher compared to the original quoted price.

What was weird was that I used the "famous" AWD, but in my bill, they quoted me with the AWD based on my Avis Wizard profile. I did not use this wizard card for the rental, but it was billed based on that. The extra amount came from the TP insurance which was included in the original reservation, but now that they changed my AWD, it was added to my rental.

I wonder if this change in billing and AWD is due to the fact that they have my Wizard details in the system? I did use the Wizard address when I collected the car.

Any idea on this?

Thanks.

Phone them up and ask them to sort it out. Tell them that you have a new AWD number and they put down your old one. They are usually pretty good at sorting it out, although they shouldn't have overcharged you in the first place.