Changing Return Location After Rental has Started?
 

I have a (pay at location) reservation with pickup from SAN and return to LAX. Duration is 21 days and I’m a President’s Circle member.

I know now that my plans might change midway through the rental, meaning that I’d want to return a little earlier (say, three days) and to a different SoCal location. I will definitely NOT know prior to the start of the rental.

Obviously, I’d need to contact Hertz if this happens; but does anyone know if this is possible and how Hertz reprices the contract?

It's easy to extend and/or switch the location of your rental after pickup. More information on that can be found in this blog post. As for pricing, it's really impossible to know. It could easily be more, less, or the same. Typically though, if you're returning in the same general area (SoCal in this case), the charges won't be too bad whereas returning in a different state or region of the country could result in a significant re-price situation.

I've done this multiple times. Give them a call once the rental has started and they'll be able to tell you the new price without actually making the change, then if you want to go ahead they'll change it. Technically they can do it at drop-off too, but that'll be much more effort as you'll need to go to the counter to get the change made before they check-in the vehicle.

In my experience, the price has always been exactly the same as what it would have been if I'd changed it before pickup. If you go into your reservation and start the change process - keeping the box about using your original rate ticket - you'll be able to see that price. I don't know for a fact it'll always be that price, but it always has been for me.

I agree with calling in and the agent can always tell you the new price, but the only annoying thing is that they never provide you with a new rental contract through email even if you ask for it.

I imagine the price will change only if you return at a different location than the location you rented from since it would be considered one-way.
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it is highly unlikely the reserved price for a SAN pickup and LAX drop would change if the drop were at, say, ONT.

All hertz pricing is highly dependent on the exact return location, so changing a one-way rental returning to X to instead return to Y can most definitely change the price.

Not at all unlikely. Not just can the rates be different, but there can also be different fees (less likely for drop-off than pickup, but they do happen)
eg, I just priced a 2-day full-size rental next week from SAN-LAX - $53.60/day, $153.56 total
Changing the return to ONT was actually cheaper by a few dollars - $51.98/day, $149.57 total
Changing the return SNA bumped the price to $66.13/day, $184.43 total, despite SNA being closer to LAX than ONT is

Even changing the return to SAN (thus removing the "one-way") increased the price to $62.02/day, $174.30 total.

it will be highly unlikely changing a one-way rental SAN-LAX to SAN-ONT would result in a material change in the price. often, one-way rentals can incur multi-hundred-dollar higher fees and starting with a one-way rental priced-in means that Hertz isn't going to whack you with an insane drop-fee when switching from one SoCal airport drop to another SoCal airport drop.

Thanks all. Sorry I’ve been a while responding!

I think I’ve significantly reduced the risk of needing to change in the meantime, but it’s good to hear your experiences. I’ll certainly call in the event I need to,

Has anyone done this post pandemic? It seems Hertz has a smaller fleet now.

It’s usually possible to do this, unless the vehicle is needed back due to sale or other disposition, but they may hit you with hefty fees. The only way to know is to call and check.

I tried to change a regular rental to a 1-way rental last month. Instead of returning to EWR, I wanted to drop off at CVG. (Long drive, no choice due to airline irrops).
It would have been an additional $700 on top of an already pricy rental.

Dropping that car off at EWR, then picking up a new one for a 1-way rental to CVG was ~$300 all in.
Didn't make any sense to me, and ended up adding 2 hours of driving to an already crappy driving day.

The glamor of business travel.... :rolleyes:

Hertz has a number of different ways to charge one-way rentals, which seem to depend on the locations involved, the phase of the moon, and which direction the wind is blowing.

One of those method is to charge a drop fee, which doesn't sound like what happened for your rental (or at least, not only)

One of the other methods is that they jack up the day rate - and that increase is often the same regardless of whether it's a 1-day rental or a multi-day rental. I just looked at EWR-EWR and EWR-CVG and it looks like that's what they are doing here. For the dates I looked at, the one-way rate was about $150/day more, regardless of the length of the rental. For a 1-day rental like you ended up doing, that obviously wasn't too much (well, relatively at least). But presuming your original rental was say a 5 day rental, it would have bumped the price ~$750.

Sometimes they do both - a different rate plus a drop fee...

Thanks for that explanation. At the time, I was going through a corporate travel agency after-hours desk, so wasn't really sure how they were checking or the reason for the price differential.

I'm renting at ATL and dropping off at HSV. Hertz wouldn't let me do the 1-way rental, so I reserved it as if I'm returning to ATL. Hopefully they won't charge me too much. I will call and inform them of the change mid-trip.

Good Luck. And I would be prepared for a really big bill.

I have looked for one-way rentals a couple of times but they came back "No cars available". Seems they have restricted one-ways quite a bit.

If you do drop off at HSV, please let us know how things went. Would be interested in how it was handled.