danstah

I recently rented a vehicle from the Bozeman airport and paid the prepaid rate through the website. Upon return I was charged $62 on my card. Not knowing what the charges were I called and was told it was normal airport fee's and taxes. I've been a longtime Avis customer (mostly paid after) but I can't say I've come across a situation where the quoted rate would differ when the car was returned with full fuel and good condition.

Is this a normal thing with Hertz?

glostix

Sounds like BS, "normal airport fees and taxes" should have shown on your confirmation email when you booked it

AutoSlash

If you have a copy of the original confirmation email showing the price breakdown, open a case with Hertz customer support. They should adjust unless it was due to some option items, or the taxes went up between the time you booked and the time you picked up the rental.

Joonydell

no, this is not a "normal thing". like Autoslash suggested, just a simple email to CS with the original price quoted should do the trick.

m907

Bozeman is a franchise location (Overland West, which is generally a good company), so there may have been some mixup between their system and Hertz's.

MojaveFlyer

I have rented from the Hertz franchisee at BZN half a dozen times, with nary a problem. Not prepaid however. They have generally seemed friendly and competent to me.

m907

Off topic, but have you rented from Billings?

MojaveFlyer

Only once about 15 years ago!

klanfa

Just had a similar issue earlier today.
Booked a reservation with Hertz points, with an estimated total of ~$65 (incl. $1.20 in airport concession recovery, as the rate is 0 when using points to fully cover the rental). At the counter, I'm quoted ~$105 incl. $46 in airport concession recovery.
I push back saying that's wrong, the concession recovery fee shouldn't be that high. Manager is called up who says fees are subject to change. I asked if there was a change in the last 2 weeks (since I booked, and was said no). Manager than changes the story and says "Hertz website doesn't calculate fees right for licensee locations, and what you have quoted in your confirmation is wrong". I tried pushing back but he was firm on charging $46 in the fee, so I kicked the can down the road to fight on the return - and check here as well as the PC CS before then.

What I assume is happening in my case is that the licensee doesn't subtract the discount and then tax it; instead it taxes and then subtracts the discount, leaving me with $45 more in airport concession recovery fee (10% of the weekly rate for the Premium car).

Any advice on how to proceed with this? I really don't want to take this to chargeback as Hertz also calculates taxes wrong on award rentals, and I only really expected to pay $45ish out of the $65 quote from email (full quote breakdown in my next post), and I don't want to end up on Hertz DNR list either.
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As a side note, I was definitely not happy with Hertz at BZN. I was offered a Grand Cherokee or a Suburban on a premium reservation - sure those are upgrades but come with a hefty gas penalty and the size I *really* don't need. Asked for anything smaller and was told no. Walked out to the car, saw a Subaru outback parked, and went back in to ask for it. "We can't change cars after printing contracts and that one is already printed on someone's contract". I volunteered for a downgrade, and still just no. Luckily for me they just got an Impala cleaned so they swapped me into that. The only positive is that their prepaid gas option is really cheap - 70-80 cents per gallon less than the gas stations in Bozeman. No 10% discount for AAA CDP though.

Dave Noble

I am a bit confused here - if I am reading it correctly, your confirmation email confirmed a rate of >$100 to pay and at the counter you are being asked to pay $105

It actually seems that you haven't got that much of a leg to stand on if this is the case if you wanted to do a chargeback

Perhaps write a letter to Customer relations querying the cost and see whether it will reimburse the $45

lhrsfo

I stopped using Avis some years ago as this happened every single time, and switched to Hertz. Now I find it happens about one in four times, always for something like $2.67. Not worth fighting about but irritating nonetheless.

klanfa

Hertz miscalculates taxes on award reservations, every time and that's just a known system issue...
i did mess up when writing this late last night: my reservation shows $65 ($30 facility, $12 vehicle licensing, $1.2 concession recovery, $22 taxes). So seems like I'm in much better shape for charge back then I thought/presented in my previous post (edited that one now for clarity too). In reality and with Hertz tax calculation issues, I only really expected to pay $45ish.
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bedelman

This doesn't surprise me at all. A similar issue -- order of multiplying and subtracting -- causes systematic overchages on Hertz Rewards redemptions of dollars-off rewards. Have to complain to location or CS every time. Agh! Wish we could sue -- but Hertz contract has an arbitration clause that purports to disallow class action litigation (or any litigation, for that matter).

SDQBound

Just happened to me today. Prepaid rate was much lower so I booked it. Rental agreement shows that I still have to pay around $30 more and shows a "Voucher" applied to the total for the amount I prepaid. Vehicle class was the same one I reserved (L) and there were no changes in the rental period. Can't waste my time complaining at the location (DCA) because I've had enough with them for the past few months and don't want them to tag me as a serial complainer, so sent a message through Twitter with no positive answer other than "they referred it to the right team".

btonkid12345

2 points:
1.) Whenever they can only offer a humongous car, I try to nicely ask them to include the tank of gas. By including it, that means having them set the starting gage to G0. In fact, they've proactively offered this sometimes to get me to accept a minivan, which always helps because a car is a car, and not paying for a full tank of gas is nice savings (although I rarely end up using it all anyways, but it is higher consumption than what I would pay with a smaller car)
2.) Prepaid gas is always a rip off because all the % taxes and fees get charged on the gas as well. Never a good deal, well maybe in MCO with an early morning departure, but that's it.