I live in Norfolk,VA and I am flying out of IAD on 8/21 and I thought I would rent a car from Thrifty or Dollar at ORF for the drive up to IAD and save my car the wear and tear and then I would rent a car at IAD when I fly back in on 8/30 and drop it off at ORF...From ORF to IAD for that day it would be approx $42 with all taxes and fees and so I thought it would be similar on the way back so it would be approx $90 for the 2 rentals which would be close to the $81 i would pay if I parked my own vehicle there for the time I am gone and I could live with that.

So, I had the ORF-IAD rental all set up and I just now checked on the IAD-ORF rental and was totally shocked. The daily rates were slightly higher, but there was an approx $62 drop fee/charge as part of the rate to get the car back to IAD I assume. The Enterprise people had told me to rent from Thrify because they don't have the drop charges.

So, my question is..Does anyone know why there would be a drop charge on the IAD-ORF rental, but not on the ORF-IAD rental? Any insight would be appreciated. Thanks.

Most likely because IAD is a major station and can handle an extra car without a problem, while ORF is a much smaller station and if they got an iflux of extra cars, they might not have the room/insurance/carrying cost budget to handle them. The drop charge is essentially a way for them to offset the cost of caravaning to IAD to return the car to its home.

Could also be a corp vs franchise issue. Not sure on that, but a franchisee might impose the charge while a corp location does not.