Big problems at ORD Hertz
 

I flew into ORD around 7pm tonight and caught a shuttle to the Hertz lot.

The #1 Gold board only had about 10 names on it, so I walked over to the rental office where a line extended out the door. A staff member walking by suggested #1 Gold members go to the Gold office nearby. Several of us walked over there only to find the doors locked and a sign saying the office was closed. We all walked back to the main rental office and got in line.

It took 55 minutes to reach the front of the line. (I estimate there were 50 people in line.) Although they had my reservation in the system, they had to radio someone in the lot to assign a car. I then had to wait another 15 minutes for them to pull a car up to the building. This is the procedure they were using for all customers as far as I could tell.

Customers in line were amazingly civil both with each other and with the Hertz staff. And the Hertz staff did a good job working through the long line of customers.

I asked the Hertz rep if this was what we could expect in the future, and all he said was that we all should "call corporate to complain" as corporate didn't tell the local staff anything.

For me, the top reason to rent from Hertz is their ability to get me to and from my car without any waiting. If this strength of theirs is gone I see no real differentiation between Hertz and several other rental companies, and price will become my main determining factor.

Wow. I just booked a rental today from ORD and debated between Hertz and Avis. I chose Avis. I picked up at 7:45 pm to a car heated and ready to go...all for $1 less than what Hertz wanted.

Both Avis and Hertz have been hit-or-miss. Avis is notorious for screwing things up when you arrive at 12:05am, their policy is to always blame the computer. Very very lame.

HTSC

While this is inexcusable, it would be very valuable to know if this was a one-time screw-up or something more common given the recently-announced staff reductions.

Same thing at BOS last week. Bad news about things to come.

Picked up a car at HNL on Friday. Got an upgrade to a convertible, but it had clearly not been cleaned (full of sand). Since there was a line at the Gold counter, we took it anyway. Upon return last night (end of a long holiday weekend), there was only one person processing returns. Fortunately we had planned for that and given ourselves plenty of time . In any case, not an impressive performance by Hertz.

return at ORD went well
 

I returned the car two days later and all was typical. Quick receipt at the car then off to the waiting bus.

I submitted an accounting of the check-in problems to Hertz customer support via email.

--- I dont think I would consider this BIG problems. I mean, you got a car... with layoffs going around, I would suspect this is going to become more routine. And defecting to another agency may be just a temporary remedy (I suspect Avis/National etc will go through staff reductions as well).

Well, I respectfully disagree with you on how BIG this issue potentially is for Hertz.

I switched to Hertz several years ago after I waited in line slightly over an hour to pick up a car at a competitor. Up to that point, I'd always checked around for rental costs, and Hertz was typically more expensive than other rental companies, so I didn't typically rent from Hertz. After my >1 hour wait, I decided a few extra bucks wasn't worth the hassle. I signed up for #1 Club Gold, and I've rented exclusively from Hertz since then. Over the past few years, I've averaged about 20-25 rental days per year. I've very happy with Hertz overall, in large part because I haven't had to wait to pick up or return a car.

If a 55-minute wait starts becoming routine at Hertz, there's no reason for me to stay loyal to them, as there won't be any difference between using them and another company. Sure, I'm just one person, but I suspect there are a fair number of other Hertz loyalists out there that feel the same way I do.

Completely agree but wondering if all the rental companies are in a race to the bottom for survival. Not a good sign when the leading company is the one to start the service cuts. Would be VERY good for Hertz to make an announcement to let us all know what is happening...

Customer service generally seems to be in decline among the car rental companies. National has gone from always responding to my e-mail inquiries within 24 hours to now taking over a month to even acknowledge the issue. And now we're hearing about loyalty problems with Hertz and Avis. The next year is going to be interesting...

I had a similar issue with Budget at SFO last year. I simply walked down to Hertz and got a car and was on my way in 5 minutes.

It amazes me that in a situation such as this people are willing to stand in line and wait, rather than take their business elsewhere. I realize that a few people may have restrictions that limit their ability to do this, but I don't believe that this would apply to most people just putting up with the situation.

Of course at ORD, once you get out to the lot, you're pretty much held hostage. You can't walk over to a competitor. You'd have to get to a bus (which means going to where cars are returned), ride back to the terminal, then wait for the competitor's bus and hope they didn't have a line out the door when you got to their lot.

I am curious about the walking to a competitor. Post #3 in this thread seems to indicate that it is no problem to walk between car rental companies after taking the bus to one.

Can anyone one confirm which is currently correct?