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Watch your car rental receipts

Sandy VDH

Sandy VDH

TUG Review Crew: Elite
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I just did a Avis rental. It took them a week to close the receipt and send it to me. However they noted that the car was returned with F on Gas, but they charged me over $62 for a fuel charge.

So check your bills, and make sure you are charged what you expected to be charged.
 
I was double charged for a week of offsite parking at the SD airport back in Oct. We are still dealing with it and have had to escalate to the credit card company. So frustrating!
 
I hope you are disputing that additional charge.
 
I called, they acknowledge the mistake and are correcting it. But I can bet that if I didn't call, they would just charge me for it.
 
Sandy VDH said:
I called, they acknowledge the mistake and are correcting it. But I can bet that if I didn't call, they would just charge me for it.
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This is the correct course of action. Far too often people just call up the credit card company and dispute the charge, which isn't the correct course of action. One is supposed to work with the merchant to try and resolve the issue. Credit card disputes are a last resort, are expensive to the merchant and those expenses get passed down to consumers in the form of higher prices.
 
dioxide45 said:
This is the correct course of action. Far too often people just call up the credit card company and dispute the charge, which isn't the correct course of action. One is supposed to work with the merchant to try and resolve the issue. Credit card disputes are a last resort, are expensive to the merchant and those expenses get passed down to consumers in the form of higher prices.
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When I said dispute I meant contact the company first. But then depending on the closing date for my credit card I may put the amount in dispute so that I won't be charged while waiting for the refund.
 
Every time I return a rental car I put the keys on the dash and take a picture of the keys, odometer, and gas level. When I get a rental car I always walk the car and take pictures of any scratches or dents before leaving the parking lot. On weeks like this one I will rent two cars in two different cities. I'm surprised how often the picture documentation with the mega data has saved me money. Hertz is the worst.

You may have seen the Hertz situation where they would report the car stolen even after it had been returned. "For years, the rental car company Hertz falsely accused hundreds of innocent customers of stealing its vehicles — accusations that, for some customers, resulted in arrests, felony charges and jail time." For that reason alone I like having a photo documenting the return.

Over the past few years I was wrongly charged for car damage, gasoline, and even a late return. The photos have paid off in every situation.
 
I took photos of the car rental return and the odometer and gas levels. Usually they are in the airport and give you a printed receipt but when i asked this time, they did not have that ability.

I was surprised to see that after a week the rental was still open. You would have figured that they needed the car last week, but who knows what is up with that. At least they showed me returning it at the right date and time.
 
We had to call Avis after Cliff was double charged at DFW in October. First car he was given had a bad accessory plug so his GPS wouldn’t work. When he returned that for a new car the next day, he got charged for that day and then they apparently set up a brand new contract at a new price for the new car. I was shocked we were able to explain our predicament to the overseas help line so that he could see what had happened. And of course two different credit cards were used. He put us on hold for ten minutes and then came back to tell us he was leaving the American Express charge alone, and issuing a credit to the Citicard. Then he walked us through the math showing us how he’d got us back to the original $350 or so contracted amount. I told him he was our hero! I really expected them not to be able to backtrack through what had happened.
 
Sandy VDH said:
I just did a Avis rental. It took them a week to close the receipt and send it to me. However they noted that the car was returned with F on Gas, but they charged me over $62 for a fuel charge.

So check your bills, and make sure you are charged what you expected to be charged.
Click to expand...
Avis is notorious for refueling charges. Most of their cars are equipped with gages that measure the gas to the .10 of gallon. I had actually topped off a rental car at an on airport gas station and they still tried to charge me $4 for .10 gallon plus a $26 refueling charge. I had to call to dispute it. Avis also is more likely to not have anyone checking in the cars at airports, so you have to trust them to get you the receipt. Most of my rentals are through Costco and Avis and Budget often have the best deals. I've shifted more rentals to Budget.
 
Superchief said:
Avis is notorious for refueling charges. Most of their cars are equipped with gages that measure the gas to the .10 of gallon. I had actually topped off a rental car at an on airport gas station and they still tried to charge me $4 for .10 gallon plus a $26 refueling charge. I had to call to dispute it. Avis also is more likely to not have anyone checking in the cars at airports, so you have to trust them to get you the receipt. Most of my rentals are through Costco and Avis and Budget often have the best deals. I've shifted more rentals to Budget.
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I will say we've not had these issues with Avis. We did have a problem with our last rental with Avis in San Francisco. We picked the car up in the city. The receipt showed the tank was full, but in fact it was half empty. We didn't notice until we were already out of the city. I called Avis and they assured us it would be taken care of when we returned the car. Sure enough when we returned the car at the Oakland airport, we were given a $40 credit on the rental.
 
Thanks. We were just overcharged $28 by Budget in Las Vegas on an Autoslash/Priceline reservation. We contacted Autoslash to make this right. Hopefully they will make this right and this won't be a finger pointing exercise.
 
Superchief said:
Avis is notorious for refueling charges. Most of their cars are equipped with gages that measure the gas to the .10 of gallon. I had actually topped off a rental car at an on airport gas station and they still tried to charge me $4 for .10 gallon plus a $26 refueling charge. I had to call to dispute it. Avis also is more likely to not have anyone checking in the cars at airports, so you have to trust them to get you the receipt. Most of my rentals are through Costco and Avis and Budget often have the best deals. I've shifted more rentals to Budget.
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We have this same problem with Budget at the SMF airport, which is the same company as Avis. We no longer use Avis and Budget.
 
Luanne said:
I will say we've not had these issues with Avis. We did have a problem with our last rental with Avis in San Francisco. We picked the car up in the city. The receipt showed the tank was full, but in fact it was half empty. We didn't notice until we were already out of the city. I called Avis and they assured us it would be taken care of when we returned the car. Sure enough when we returned the car at the Oakland airport, we were given a $40 credit on the rental.
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Have never had trouble with Avis either, mostly rentals in Hawaii. Very straightforward; I get a full tank and return it full.
 
Autoslash was very responsive. Found on receipt that we were charged for refueling a small amount and that comes with airport concession fees making the charge 3x the gas. Thankful to Autoslash for finding this in the maze of charges.

Now need to contact Budget to show our photo of full tank of gas and gas receipt. What a hassle!

Will now not use BUDGET. We had this same thing happen at Thrifty a few years ago in Spokane and avoid them.
 
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CalGalTraveler said:
Autoslash was very responsive. Found on receipt that we were charged for refueling a small amount and that comes with airport concession fees making the charge 3x the gas. Thankful to Autoslash for finding this in the maze of charges.

Now need to contact Budget to show our photo of full tank of gas and gas receipt. What a hassle!

Will now not use BUDGET. We had this same thing happen at Thrifty a few years ago in Spokane and avoid them. Same company?
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They're all the same, just depends on the location and who is working that day. Some probably are worse than others.
 
What is worse is that they now do not like to show your receipt when you return so you do not see detaills and total until after the fact when you are more likely to forget.

Sneaky.
 
davidvel said:
They're all the same, just depends on the location and who is working that day. Some probably are worse than others.
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Yeah, none are really any better than others. I never understand the "i won't rent from so and so". At some point in time if you stop renting with an agency that has screwed something up, you will no longer be able to rent a car from anyone.
 
CalGalTraveler said:
What is worse is that they now do not like to show your receipt when you return so you do not see detaills and total until after the fact when you are more likely to forget.

Sneaky.
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The last two rentals we had there wasn't really anyone even there to scan cars back in. Just drop the car and go and they email you your receipt later. Leaving any disputes up to being fought later. Though even if someone is there, they never seem to do anything except check the mileage and gas gauge and hand you a receipt, still leaving you open to an issue later if they find damage or something else they feel like charging you for.
 
Sandy VDH said:
I just did a Avis rental. It took them a week to close the receipt and send it to me. However they noted that the car was returned with F on Gas, but they charged me over $62 for a fuel charge.

So check your bills, and make sure you are charged what you expected to be charged.
Click to expand...

Had the same issue with Avis just a couple of weeks ago, and again a few months ago. Avis is now on my **** list.

I was able to get them to reverse the charge by contacting them via social media, so at least I didn’t have to take the time to call as I did the first time.

Also, take pictures of the car before and after including the fuel gauge with mileage showing in the same pic.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 
Wow! I've never had any of these problems with National. Never had any problem with them, and the price has always been less than Costco and others--at least for where I was going.
 
In June, we had to get a $79 charge for underage driver taken off of our bill @ Budget in San Diego. It was just my wife & I on the trip, so I asked them why 48 was considered underage. The charge wasn’t on our initial checkout paperwork but was added as we checked the car in & was in our emailed receipt.
 
We've never had an issue with Avis but now will watch out for it. It seems like they plan on you not noticing.
 
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I always take pictures and a video of the rental car no matter where we are. As far as the main car rental companies go I have had a few problems returning cars in Mexico. One time we had a flat and couldn't make it to the gas station. I couldn't find the jack and had to borrow one from a stranger. Turns out that the jack is under the drivers seat. The guy that worked at the car rental place said he would fill it up for $20 so that was easy. Another car was missing the wheel cover but that's how we received it. I showed the picture and all was well.

The golf ball sized dent in the brand new Avis sedan wasn't there when we picked up the car. It took maybe 20 minutes for Avis to decide it was fine. Avis actually measured the dent and said it was within their guide lines of acceptable. I thought for sure it was going to cost my credit card something.

We havn't had a problem in the USA or Canada with rental cars yet. Especially now days when we get an email with the final bill as we leave.

Bill
 
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