Am I being Unreasonable?
 

I am currently in the middle of a 6-week business trip to the US (mostly Ohio) and booked a 3-week rental of a Compact car with Budget - prepaying through Expedia's UK site. When I arrived into Cleveland airport at the time of my booking, I was informed that all they had left was a Santa Fe (Intermediate SUV) - in fact the actual words were "I hope you don't mind a Santa Fe as that's all we have available". Now, I am here on my own for 6 weeks and I'd have preferred a smaller/more economical car but as it was all they had left, I just took the keys and that was that.

When time came to hand the car back, I got back to the hire car centre and was asked if I wanted to charge to the same credit card.. I agreed thinking this was perhaps one of the various taxes that had not been added into the prepayment. Later on, reviewing the documentation however, I noticed they had charged me $350 of "non-pkg items".

I opened a customer service ticket asking what this was and was told, in reply, that it was an upgrade fee including taxes. I then replied saying I did not voluntarily upgrade - i was given no option to which I received a reply saying they would have to review my bill after 48 hours.

Anyway, after hearing nothing after the 72-hour point, I called Customer Services and asked for an update and was told that as I had signed the contract, they would split half the cost with me. I declined and asked to escalate the issue to a Supervisor which is where the case is now.

Is this normal in the US? I mean, I've rented cars in the US before with Alamo/AVIS and I regularly rent cars in the UK where the rental company have supplied me with a car in a higher band but I've never been in a position where they then tried to charge me for it. Surely, if they are unable to honour the reservation, that's their fault and not mine right?

Or is this fairly common and I'm just being naive?

Check the contract you signed, the t&c of the rental and the t&c of the third-party booking site. Those will provide you with the legal answer.

As to whether it's "usual" the answer is that the rental company will always try to sell more product and it's incumbent on the customer to insist, particularly where, as here, you did not really want the upsell, at the time of rental, that there be no additional charges as the result.

I just had this happen in MCO, too. The agent tells you you have to get an upgrade but doesn't say anything about a fee. The agent is counting on you not noticing the upgrade line item on the contact. The agent gets a commission for a paid upgrade which is why they do it.

I don't like to do business with companies you have to watch like a hawk for cheating you, so I won't rent from then again.

Charging for "free" upgrades seems to be increasingly a problem with Budget. Several other posters have recently encountered the same thing.

Maybe it's the latest of Avis/Budget's trial balloons to see what revenue shenanigans they can successfully pull to get more money from the customers. They seem to be on the forefront of doing that, but it seems they haven't tried anything new in a while.

Make sure to stress that the agent specifically told you the Santa Fe was the only car they had on the lot and that you were forced to take it against your wishes. That's the best argument you have. Too bad you (and they) don't have audio proof of that; one franchised location I'm familiar with actually has a sophisticated HD audio-video surveillance system at their front counter and regularly reviews video footage during customer disputes. (Most customers are found to be untruthful [some even immediately back down from their complaints when they hear their transaction was recorded :D], but in many cases, the managers at that branch review the footage and determine that the customer was right and do end up acknowledging the mix-up and making it right. That should be standard at all rental counters, IMHO.)

Crooks if you ask me. There are lots of avenues to deal with this in the "Court of Public Opinion" I would try legal avenues including my credit card company, and to the various municipal, state, and federal organizations that they must certify with. BBB, media, news, Ombudsmen.

When writing in online forums, make sure to use as the full company name and address in every post so that your post is captured by other consumers' google searches for the company/location.

If it ends up rolling enough steam, maybe you can start a class action suite (misspelling to highlight how little legalese I really know).

Read that contract. Read it very close. I've had Enterprise try every trick in the book. No issues like that with Budget yet.

bad one

This is BS. Dispute the charge.

Not impressed with budget. I use Hertz weekly for business but used some credit card points for a recent rental with budget. Paid $3 to get my DL points....guess what...no points.

Car had a toll reader on it....guess what....got fined for going through the toll. So obviously budget does not keep the toll readers up to date.

Oh, and the car was a piece of junk.

If I stick to Delta, SPG, and Hertz, I have no issues. Everytime I go outside that box I seem to get screwed.

The problem, of course, is the signed contract. If you dispute it with your credit card, the car agency can just provide them with a copy showing that yes, you did agree to the extra charge. If it was a charge that wasn't on the contract, then yes, a dispute would be easy. And the contract also explicitly says that verbal agreements are not valid.

The whole scheme depends on you not reading all the terms and relying on what the agent tells you, but that's not how the contract is written. The company can take it up as a customer service issue, since they (probably) don't want agents scoring extra commissions this way or customers posting online about it, but legally I think you're stuck if they won't voluntarily refund it.

For the record, Budget locations are franchises and, yes, some of them are run by crooks. Have had this experience and similar as well and unfortunately there's really no way to know ahead of time if you're going to get one of the "bad" ones.

Had a similar experience in HOU. Was told by lady at airport desk there was a Jeep that "I would be mich more comfortable in" for only $2 more. This was a Priceline rental, so I politely declined (but not forcefully enough) as I didn't want ANY extra charges. She calls the lot (I guess to see what cars are available), can't get anyone to answer the phone and then mumbles "oh I'll just put you in the jeep anyways." ok, to me that sounds like a free upgrade. I even confirm with the lot agent before i drive off that there are no additional fees here right? - I'm prepaid with Priceline. Of course he just tells me what I want to hear and doesn't really look at my receipt. And nor did I understand it either because I thought the amt on the receipt was confirming the amount I had paid Priceline. (they were also charging me $35 for an extra hour rental because I was an hour early). At any rate, I phoned CS after returning my rental and reluctantly they credited back the extra hour and measly $2 upgrade fee. The lesson I learned here was threefold: be more assertive, understand the est charges on receipt fully before leaving lot, and that the receipt should have said $0.00 - as it was a Priceline rental.

I don't rent from Budget for the same reason. Every transaction is a new damn chess match / battle of wits with people who are trying to hurt you.

When we have our periodic fuel price jumps in the US there is a run on compact cars in the rental lot and they sell out. SUVs and V6/V8 cars gather cobwebs. The agency has to get late-arriving customers who reserved compacts to accept bigger vehicles.

The first tactic is to try to sell the upgrade, although (A) they'll eventually have to give it to you anyway because it's all they have left, and (B) they should be paying you, not vice versa, because you'll be spending much more on gas than you expected.

Second tactic is to award you the upgrade like it's a prize instead of a burden, but then charge sneakily for it without saying so, which is what happened to the OP.

Only after you refuse both those deals and scrutinize your rental contract like Jerry Maguire do you have a chance of fair treatment.

In the whole travel world, car rentals are the clearest case of "you get what you pay for." I stick to Avis and Hertz. No trust in any of the others.

For the record, Budget locations are franchises

Actually, Budget's website has a search function that identifies locations as corporate-owned or independent licensees. Most branches in major metropolitan areas are corporate-owned, share cars with corporate Avis, and frequently have a mix of cars with out of state plates that randomly circulated in from all areas of the US. Some rural areas and beach cities have franchises. Those are often buyer beware.

No, you're not being unreasonable.

I had a similar experience at PHX. My car was in the shop and I needed to drive to SoCal, so I reserved an "intermediate SUV" which Budget described as a Ford Escape or similar. This was on sale, as it were, and was only a few dollars higher than renting the full-sized car, so I figured why not.

Got to the counter and Budget counter and the agent looked at my reservation and said she, "Oh, good, I have a very nice Buick SUV for you." She ran my credit card and entered my DL and the amount popped up on the screen in front of me and I was told to initial the areas and sign.

I looked at the total and it was $100 more than my reservation. I told the agent there was something wrong and pulled out the printed copy of my reservation. She looked me directly in the eyes and said, "Oh, I upgraded you and that is the cost of the upgrade."

I told her I didn't request the upgrade and to put me back in the original car. She said, "But that means I will have to cancel this transaction!" I shot right back, "Them cancel the transaction and give me the car on my reservation."

Of course, the CS aspect went downhill from there and she begrudgingly gave me a Dodge Nitro at the same amount as my reservation.

I filed a complaint and demanded to speak with the district manager, but never got anything more than a form letter apology and a $25 voucher.

And I am willing to wage a week's pay that the same agent at Budget PHX is still doing the same slight-of-hand maneuver to any customer she can.