One Way Fee "problem"
 

Hi all,

actually I rent a lot of cars but this is the first US rental when I have to pay a one way fee. Losing my "paying one way rental fee" virginity... Anyway.

I always read and thought that hertz charges one way fees by distance between cities. The catalogue of the ADAC ("German AAA") shows a chart where it is by distance, too.
The chart form the ADAC indicates:
old valid thur Apr. '15:
501 to 1500 miles -> $300
1501+ -> $500
new valid from May '15:
501 to 1500 miles -> $300
1501+ -> $750 (!!!)

Since nov. '14 I'm checking prices for my expected DEN - LAX rental in september. The one way fee was $300 which seemed to be correct because the distance is about 1,050 miles.
When we decided to place a reservation end of january the one way fee was $750 (plus tax and concession etc, in total about $940)!!!!

So I asked the German Hertz customer service and they told me that Hertz USA doesn't charge one way fees by distance but how many states are between the pick-up state and the drop-off state. This seems a little bit awkward to me?! Or is this really true?

So why did the system offered me $300 (which seems to be correct, the distanca DEN - LAX is about 1,050 miles) and now $750?!

The whole thing doesn't make much sense to me, because if the customer service is right, why didn't they offered me $500 but $300 in 2014?

I hope anyone here can help or explain this to me! This enormous one way fee nearly doubles the quote.

Sincerely,

Zmirnoff

I'm not sure how it's calculated, but I know that the fee is added daily. It's not a one time fee. For example, if you reserve a car for a day it might cost $150. But if you reserve it for a month it will likely cost $3000+. But for the same car not going one way it may only cist $600 for a month. I hope this makes sense.

In other words, if you are going one way but intend to have a rental for longer than a few days, it's probably better to rent the one way vehicle for as short of time as possible and switch to another rental when arriving at your destination.

Depends on the locations , regions and what it wants to charge

If it was $300 when you 1st checked, then if you had booked it that time you would have got it for $300 ; since then the location may have adusted its fees and now for the rental you want it is $750

There is no fixed calculation that can be applied globally to one way rentals

Things like this have been discussed in numerous threads. European rate plans usually get a low daily rate plus a flat, taxable drop charge. US retail rate plans generally get a higher daily rate with no separate drop charge, or a corporate rate plan with a fixed daily rate plus a per-mile fee. A reason for the difference in rate presentation is differences in expectations stemming from how and why each customer group rents and pays for cars.

There is no "transparent" way to dissect or predict one-way pricing. It's proprietary, and depends on relative demand as well as depreciation due to mileage. (For one-ways between corporate stores, the cars are not sent back.) Go with whichever combination and company offer the lowest total price.

Hertz is usually good for one-way availability and location choice. However, they are attempting to raise all their prices. They need to pay for all the new 2015 cars they're buying, to replace the aging cars they've kept for the past several years.

To elaborate a little, renting between two specific cities could result in different one-way rates depending which direction you're going. There are areas where Hertz (and the other companies too) need more cars for certain times of the year, and less for others, so they give discounts to move cars away from areas that don't need them, and higher rates for customers taking cars where they have an excess.