that's great news, unfortunately my experience were different

Location: YYZ (Toronto)
Class reserved: Full
Status: Prefer select
Car Received: Malibu

Out of my 20 rentals at the airport in toronto, I have received zero upgrade. To top my bad experience, they have gave me a MALIBU (intermediate class) after i have booked for a full size with an upgrade cupon code. I am kind of sick with the avis at toronto and willing to give another company my business pretty soon.


Location: LGA
Class reserved: Full size
Status: Preferred Select
Car Received: Volvo S60

upon arrival, i was greeted by the prefer counter and gave me the options of car to pick (Lincoln town car and volvo S60). I immediately took S60. great service and option of cars at this airport

What is that smell? I refer to it as the Avis Smell. All of my rentals smell the same. They smell like someone might have smoked in it at some point in its career, but not recently enough to really smell like cigarettes. Does any air freshener work on it? It's not blatantly unpleasant, but not the way i want my car to smell.

I would love to take advantage of that but unfortuntately renting a car and driving through NYC is like suicide.

LOL - for those of us this side of the pond that pay exorbitant fuel prices, renting an SUV is part of the fun when on holiday !!

When it really mattered:

MHT (Manchester, NH)
Jan 21
Status Preferred Select
Reserved Full Sized
Received Suburu Outback! under 4K miles

Let it snow let it snow let it snow.

Location: IAH
Class reserved: Intermediate
Status: Preferred Select
Car Received: Hyundai Sonata

I guess it was technically an upgrade, but it was fairly high mileage and it stank (stunk?) of smoke. Unfortunately I didn't realize how bad the smell was at first (thinking it was just the "Avis smell" mentioned in a previous post), so I didn't ask for a different car. I had to drive around for a couple of days with the windows down (fortunately this was feasible in Houston in January in Houston - it wouldn't work in August).

Location: FRA
Class reserved: Mid-Size (VW Golf etc.)
Status: Presidents Club
Car Received: Audi A4 S-Line TDI (with exactly 10 km on, so probably first rental and a brand new car)

- Location: LON - 5 day rental
- Class Reserved: 5 Door compact manual -Ford Focus 1.4
- Car Received: Mercedes E240
- Your status: None...

but i love being a travel agent waving my IATA id card..;)

there is nothing more irritating to an avis manager (and probably other managers as well) than a TA waiving an Iata Card demanding an upgrade, or even expecting an upgrade.

Its okay to ask, but I actually denied an agent an upgrade, she used every trick in the book, and I called her employer and explained what happened before she had the chance to try and snowball her boss.

I got an apology letter from her and her travel agency.

Morale of the story is....you may be able to threaten some vendors, but not all of them.

True story number 2.

Customer (iata card, business card, the whole 9 yards) reserved for a compact car for 5 people. Upon arrival, he demanded to know what cars were available for upgrade.

This bieng christmas Eve, there was NOTHING. We were actually overbooked in most car classes, but we had a compact car waiting for him.

He saw an H3 hummer drive on the lot, said he will pay total 50 dollars a day for the hummer and said "other locations do that for me all the time." he went on to say "as an IATA Member, I am required to give him every last courtesy, and whenever he wants something he is supposed to get it.

30 seconds worth of memo perusing found me a memo, written 2 days earlier, stating that no group, even chm are "entitled" to the Group X class cars. Another memo, which took 4 min longer to find, stated "IATA members are not entitled to "free upgrades" automatically. All discounts eligible are included in the standard IATA discount AWD (which i have seen on here), nothing else. "

Enboldened with this knowledge, I told him no. He started to yell in the location, I said yell from the curb, by the way give me back the keys to that compact. i yanked em from his hands. Voided his contract and told him he is not welcomed at this location.

15 min later, he came back in, started yelling about how he was going to steer all his business away from avis "worldwide."

AFter another 30 min of him complaining to the 800 numbers, I get a call. After explaining myself to the 800 number, and to my district manager, he was allowed to rent, ONLY his reserved car, at the established price in the reservation, no upgrades, no discounts, and no apologies from my staff or myself. He was to return the car, no extensions, and was not allowed to buy any LDW for the car.

Another story....

Travel agent comes in claims to have reserved a full size car. Reservation says "mid size". Says its our error and to give her the full size car at the the mid size price or less.

I told her to go to hertz. The look of shock on her face was magnificent. She picked up the phone called her office, and checked her notes, only to find that she actually did reserve a mid size car.

Tail between her legs, she asks if she can still get the car she reserved, as "hertz is sold out.", I gave her original car, no upgrades.


Travel agents, if you ask me nicely, explain your situation, I will give you the best possible outcome that I can live with given my current situation. but dont come to me with a chip on your shoulder waiving your IATA card like a state department immunity declaration demanding more than what you reserved for.

Ask..dont demand.

Wow... i couldn't believe my luck.. and joked that i should take a trip to Vegas to try that luck!

It was my first rental with Avis as our agency has agreements with Europcar and i was definately happy!... but so was the rental agent when i told her there was still a cd in the cd player that she loved..seems they had quite a collection of cd's left in the cars..

and finally ezmonee.. i'd hate to think you think all IATA card holders are like the ones you have mentioned.

By the time I left, I had been doing this for over 10 years.

in that 10 year span, Id say that 3% of ALL customer complaints came from IATA members wanting discounts. Thats 3% of ALL complaints. Not just travel agents. Considering 1 in 600 customers has something to do with travel, thats a staggering amount.

I frequently gave out comps and upgrades to IATA members. But the ones who "demand" something because they are "IATA" usually end up stomping their feet.

Good news - I rented a car at the Glendale CA Hilton to drive down to Irvine on Thursday. They upgraded me from intermediate to a premium Buick Lucerne. Actually, it was the only car left.

Bad news - when I got on I-5, I noticed there was only 1/8 tank of gas. I didn't notice it in the dark garage when I got in the car. So I put 3 gallons in when I got to Irvine (about 50 miles), it went up to almost 1/4.

When I returned the car at SNA yesterday, I told the attendent what happened. He asked if I called about it, I said I didn't think to do that. I told him the gauge is the same as when I picked it up. He said he would let it go this time, but if it happens again to call. When I looked at my receipt, it showed that I drove 713 miles! It was probably only about 80, the beginning mileage was wrong.

Lesson learned - check the gas gauge and the odometer when you get in, especially at a non-airport location.

As a Chairman:

PSP
Reserved Intermediate ($25/day at the last moment with a discount found on FT!)
Got a Lincoln Town Car. (They still have Lincolns??)

Biggggggggg car! Nice car, 7000 miles, nice interior, sunroof which I really, really like but no XM radio. :(

Mgr said, "It's the biggest car we've got". :rolleyes: :D I am going to start calling the locations in the morning as I do not necessarily want the "biggest car we've got". But I appreciate the gesture.

Location: ORD
Class reserved: Intermediate
Status: Chairman
Car Received: Cadillac DTS

It was a great car but I think I'll phone ahead and see if there's something smaller next time. Quite a boat in the city but the distance sensor for parking works great, but would like something smaller that gets better mileage.

Haha... I think it's a little unfair for the Chairman's members to post their upgrades ;)

The Volvo S60 was a great choice before they axed it as a CHM upgrade. I didn't find the CTS to get better mileage than the DTS.. but at least it's smaller. At this point, I don't even know what to suggest anymore.