Preventing the Spread of Germs in Rental Cars?
 

What's the current view on the cleanliness of rental cars, Hertz or otherwise? Are you confident that enough is being done to actually sanitize the cars to prevent the spread of germs? Are you taking any personal precautions if you're still renting cars during this health crisis? If you are concerned, what would make you more comfortable?

Thanks, everyone.

All these companies email with their supposed new cleaning procedures. Unless it's something like Admirals Club packing trays and moving the beverage dispensers, I don't believe a lot of it.

I always figured there are germs in the car. If you're worried about it, I'd recommend disinfecting all the surfaces yourself.

Hertz sent an email yesterday with this:

"Please also know that we continue to maintain our high standards for safety and cleanliness. In addition to practicing preventative measures to reduce the spread of germs within our facilities, all of our vehicles go through a rigorous, multi-step cleaning process for each rental. We remain vigilant in upholding these practices and will take additional precautions as recommended by the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC), World Health Organization (WHO) and local governments."

National sent an email with more forceful language about what they're doing.

I spoke to someone in Enterprise's corporate office (which includes National and Alamo) the other day. She said they have always sanitized high-touch points and have doubled down recently. Since the Enterprise/National corporate ladder starts at the bottom and most of their corporate employees start at airports and local branches, I'd be more likely to believe they're actually doing it (versus Hertz which doesn't seem to care much about its employees and the feeling is probably mutual).
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Even before the recent crisis, it's not a bad idea to bring some disinfectant wipes with you to the airport and wipe down your plane seat and armrests, and wipe down surfaces in the rental car too.

As this pertains to all the rental car companies, I moved this thread to the general discussion of rental cars.

Thanks
Jason8612 Hertz Mod

Thanks to those that responded. Most of you that had seen this probably recall I was with Hertz for over 20 years. Now I find myself looking at the travel industry as an outsider but as someone that works for the company that produces Lysol, I know that in the past I'd seen stories where reporters took sample swabs of steering wheels and showed how germ infested they were. I was curious what the actual traveler sentiment is right now. When I was at Hertz, I would continuously identify problems with the website based on analytics and then propose solutions accordingly. I know that a lot of people have stopped traveling full stop, but for those that haven't, I'm just trying to figure out if there is anything more I can be doing for the future.

I recently (corona driven) started sanitizing myself with Clorox wipes before I drive it off the lot. Hertz can't properly vacuum a car let alone getting potential Covid-19 off surfaces.

I can infer how clean the inside must be from how clean the outside is, and it makes me glad I won't be renting any time soon.

Why does Hertz's website never get fixed?