And in your perfect little world that may work out. However, here in the real world, life is not that easy. You are quoted a price before taxes and other fees every where you do business, even McDonalds and Papa Johns.
I do so love it when other people do the work so I don’t have to: Stop saying “that’s how the world is” as though it were morally important.
Of course you’re quoted a price before taxes and fees everywhere. That’s what he wants to fix. The fact that the status quo is to advertise price-before-fees doesn’t make it some sort of universal constant or constitutionally-enshrined requirement.
There is no mystery here. As previously stated when you book online the fees are given to you, if you inquire at the counter the fees are given to you. We are not trying to hide anything. The majority of our customers have rented cars before and know what they are contracting for. Therefore, we don’t bring out the power point diagrams to illustrate the entire contract for every transaction. Any optional items on the contract, additional insurance for example, are reviewed prior to the contract signing. Non-optional items are not reviewed unless at the request of the customer.
We have no laws, besides the ones you and everyone else obides by. However, we are heavily regulated by local government. In our area, we do not have a tire/battery fee nor do we have a frequent flier miles fee. But we do have other required fees. I’ll give you an example, last year when the energy crisis was in full swing we were notified by local government that they were going to begin charging us an “energy surcharge”. Don’t ask me what the hell that is, or what it is used for. I have no idea. But we now had to pay .54 for every days rental on every vehicle rented. We, in turn, added that fee onto the contract and now every customer that rents pays an additional .54 per day. It is on the contract as an energy surcharge. Monthly we submit a report showing every vehicle and the number of days rented, with a check. Annually, they will audit our records to ensure that we reported properly and didn’t short them. They will pull contracts to ensure that the energy surcharge was properly accounted for.
Now, it would make my job a hell of a lot easier if I could have just rolled that .54 into the daily rental charge. But I am required to separate it so that the auditors can see it.
But they do. You just didn’t bother to read all the fine print in the rental agreement, either online before you even went to pick up the car, or while you were standing there with your luggage. They hand you the rental agreement that shows you every last fee and surcharge and you can decide right then and there if you don’t want to pay all that. Fine, don’t take the car then. The reservation agents will explain every last fee while you are making your reservation, if you ask what fees will be charged in addition to sales tax. You get several opportunities to find out up front what the costs are. Caveat Emptor means it’s your responsibility to find out what you are paying for before you pay for it. The major car rental companies make that information available to you in several ways so you can make informed decisions before you’re standing there with a bunch of screaming kids, a tired spouse, and a metric fuck-ton of luggage.
DISCLAIMER: I used to work as a CSR for a car rental company.
Complete bullshit.
You are shown the total price before you book or reserve online. Go look at Orbiz, Travelocity, or the car rental companies’ own websites.
You are not at their mercy. Many, if not all, car rental companies don’t even require you to give credit card info before you reserve and allow you to cancel the reservation any time without penalty. This is a much more lenient policay than most hotels that require a day or two notice if you need to cancel, and good luck doing any sort of change or cancellation with an airline once you’ve bought your ticket, unless you paid heaps of $$$.
Actually, I know of several restaurants in my hometown (where we have a tax on meals at restaurants, to bilk tourists) where the “Meals Tax” is figured into the price. This is applied unevenly across town, so you have to look for a “Plus Ashland’s 5% meals tax” or a “Includes Ashland’s 5% Meals Tax” note somewhere. Your basic point stands, though.
How is this the consumer’s problem?
It’s not, unless he makes it his problem by bitching about the way a particular industry does business.
correct.
I mean, a car rental company in a SINGLE CITY could not even advertise one all-inclusive rate, because frequently the airport authority dings the company with a charge for having a pick up/drop off location at the airport. So the rate will be different from the same company if you pick up at a downtown location vs. an airport location.
This is the way it is with this industry. Suck it up.
From Orbitz:
- Review car rental cost
Base rate $32.04
2 days @ $16.02/day
Taxes and fees $21.88
Total car rental estimate $53.92 USD
Amount due now $0.00 USD
Amount due at pick-up
Base rate and taxes and fees . $53.92 USD *
I clicked the link “taxes and fees”.
*Taxes and Fees
11.1PCT AIRPORT ACCESS FEE $4.00
3PCT ARENA TAX $1.47
7PCT SALES TAX $3.43
VEHICLE LICENSE FEE $3.98
CUSTOMER FACILITY CHARGE $9.00 *
This is pretty clear to me.
What’s with all the 11.11% airport fees? That’s such a random number to be standard.
Well, it’s +1/9th, which is kind of an odd denominator; but where I would guess it comes from.
You just might be that honest. I’m not foolish enough to rely on it, however, because odds are the next guy isn’t.
Everywhere you do business? That isn’t true. I thought this poster was from Australia, where it may work differently.
I know it does in South Africa, where VAT is included in quoted prices. You can see it broken out on your receipt, but if you purchase something for R399.95 you pay R399.95 even though some of that is tax.
I definitely prefer that to the United States system, although I think it may be harder to implement it that way here due to very small regions (counties and cities, etc) being able to set their own tax rates (South African VAT is a constant throughout the nation).
I also find advertising “Starting at $35” but having to pay $50 to be distasteful. There is a temptation to be furious about it when it comes to renting cars, but to be perfectly honest I always book online and see the real total cost before committing (and I’ve never made a reservation that wasn’t 100% refundable if I found a better deal later). This makes it a minor annoyance rather than making me feel like I’m being ripped off.
Count me in on this as well. Compulsory charges should always be included in the price up front.
So I guess that neither I, nor Mr Enfield (from Australia) live in the real world then? In New Zealand it is normal, and in fact a statutory requirement that taxes are INCLUDED in the advertised price.
Anyone that advertised a price exclusive of some obscure or arcane fee in New Zealand (for example: compulsory tyre inflation charge) would run afoul of advertising industry body, as well as our equivalent of consumer rights commission.
Just because this is “how it works in America” doesn’'t make it the best, most ethical way to do business or that the rest of the world doesn’t operate differently
So when Thrifty’s New Zealand advertises a rate of $76/day for a medium size car, they automatically include the fact that there is an airport or ferry terminal charge of $35.00, depending on which location you rent from plus GST of $70.88/week, unless you rent from a non-airport or ferry location, in which case you would pay $76/day with no additional $35 and also $66.50/week for GST, since the GST does not include the airport fee that you did not pay.
Is that about right? Confusing, isn’t it?
Because when I get a quote from Thrifty car New Zealand, they BREAK OUT the Ferry/Airport terminal charge and the GST from the total price, just like everywhere else. They can’t advertise it at a single, all inclusive price, since it depends on where I pick up the car.
You see, the thing is with the rental car business, the various fees and taxes that local, state and federal authorities have put on it are so varied across rental areas, there is no way that a single , all inclusive price can be quoted or advertised.
Haven’t I said this before? Hello! Is this thing on?
Well considering that BY LAW in New Zealand GST must be included in the advertised price I am not sure what you are talking about.
If there is a way NOT to pay the ferry / airport fee then of course you advertise the lower price, and have this as an optional extra.
My perfect little world happens to be Australia, where prices are displayed “all-inclusive”. Ditto NZ, and, I believe, the UK. It’s the US (and possibly Canada) that’s the odd one out here, at least in the English-speaking world- as bengangmo and driver8 have already point out.
I sort of agree with you Martini. But part of the problem is that many of the fees are one time only fees. And the rates are per day.
So, initially, all you see is your per day rate. Once you enter all your information, it can add up all the fees + the rate * number of days.
When I look for a rental car at an airport, I just look at the day rate (understanding that fees will be added).