Late pick up issue
 

Are there any issue in not picking up the car at the reserved time slot? I reserved a one way rental for pick up next week, and now may need to pick it up two hours later than the reserved time. It is not a prepay and I am Gold Plus so they should have the car sitting in a stall waiting for me at the reserved time.

I tried to modify the pick up time online and Hertz repriced the reservation at twice the rate, so I did not go through with the modification. Will Hertz reprice the reservation when I actually pick it up two hours late? Does the fact that it is a one way rental make it harder to change without a penalty?

Many years ago, I was told that they don't care as long as I pick it up within the same day. Anyone has any recent experience?

They are more strict now, especially in HLEs. If it is a small office I would call ahead.

Thanks. That is what I kind of expected, especially since they actually have a car with my name attached to it taking up a spot. Operationally, that may create an issue for them.

But what happens when people's flights got delayed for a few hours, I imagine that happens often. Do they reprice at the new pick up time, or just let the old reservation stand?

There shouldn't be any repricing as long as you pick up the same day of the reservation and you return after the same time period (e.g. if you were supposed to pick up at 3 and you pick up early at noon, return it by noon).

I've definitely picked up hours late or early with no issue at airport locations.

Only thing I ran into is after like 4 hours they take away your assigned car (if you reserved a specific class and were preassigned a car) and tell you to go to the gold booth to get a new car. I just picked something from PC and went to the exit booth with no issue.

Thanks. This is exactly what I wanted to know. I normally would just modify my pick up time to a later time, but the Hertz website kept repricing it, that made me a little concerned.

Good to know that you did not experience any issue for picking up late. Thanks again.

In my experience National will automatically push your return time back by however late you were, but Hertz will not, so make sure you return it by the originally scheduled dropoff time.

Hertz won't show an adjusted time on your contract, but you can still return it as much later as you picked up for the same price.

What [MENTION=894558]missingcolours[/MENTION] said has been my experience, too. 24 hr cycle from the actual pick up time has been my experience.

On another note, [MENTION=894558]missingcolours[/MENTION] or for that matter any one else, in your experience, have you not had an issue with repricing for both airport & HLE local pickups as long as you pick up the same day of the reservation [for both early & late pickups.] That would save me some time.

Good to know. I had an extra hour charge added to my receipt when I picked up early once but I can't remember if it was actually charged.

Let me give an example here from my personal experience. The booking was from 9.30 am Day 1 to 9.30 am Day 2. I picked up the car at 8.45 am. When the contract was printed, my total charge was higher because the Hertz system calculated the total rental duration from 8.45 am Day 1 to 9.30 am Day 2. I told them right there to change the drop off time to 8.45 am & a new contract was printed with my original rate.

What I don't know & would be good to know is what if I had NOT got my drop-off time changed & instead brought the car back in before 8.45 am on Day 2. What would I have had to pay in that case?

The contract has an estimated total based on the information in the system -- in your case it added an extra day to reflect the return 45 minutes later. You would have been charged based on actual usage of the car.

That's good to know.

The exception to this is that some locations will print out of the contract in advance for Gold members (at non-UC locations). When they do this they normally add a buffer to allow for you arriving late, but it's maybe 30-60 minutes not more.

If you pickup 2 hours late, the original time (+ buffer) will stand as the pickup time unless you explicitly ask them to update it.

Any time the contract is printed at pickup time, including UC, it'll be the actual pickup time and the allowed return time will be multiples of 24 hours later, plus the 29 minute grace period although the contract will still show the time you selected for return.

There used to be some exceptions to this, such as weekend rates that required the car to be returned by midday Monday and returning it later would cause the rate to be recalculated at a higher per-day rate (even if the number of days didn't increase), but these seem to have disappeared in recent years.

This has happened to me in the past which I was fortunately able to get resolved when I brought the car back in. Now, I always ask for the contract to reflect correct pick up time.