Travel comes with a lot of unexpected fees that consumers have to be wary of but generally have no way of avoiding.
President Joe Biden has targeted the resort fees many hotel chains and Las Vegas Strip casinos don't share in their advertised pricing. Some companies show a lower number and then tack on a daily fee (often between $30 and $50) for amenities like internet, gyms, pools, and other shared spaces.
Related: Popular venue off the Las Vegas Strip closes abruptly
You can't, of course, opt out of paying those fees even if you don't plan to use those services. Biden wants hotels and resorts to have to prominently list the full price of your stay, not show you a lower number and then actually charge you more.
That type of unexpected charge is not uncommon in the travel industry, but that's not the only pricing tactic consumers need to be wary of. Many airlines and hotels sell fares and stays that are nonrefundable. In many cases, passengers have the option of buying a refundable ticket or room reservation but at a higher cost.
In the rental car industry, however, reservations have generally been more suggestions than an actual contract between the customer and the car company. It's not entirely uncommon for someone to show up at the rental car counter at the time of their reservation and find that the type of car they have reserved has sold out.
In other cases, it's also possible to arrive and literally find that the company has no cars and may not get any back that day. In most cases, rental car reservations, unless you make them on Booking Holdings' BKNG Priceline or another mass reseller site, do not require upfront payment or even putting a credit card down.
That leads to a lot of no-shows (in most cases), which is why a company can run out of cars. Many rental car companies overbook based on knowing that some customers will not show up, but when they do, mayhem erupts.
Now, Hertz HTZ has a new way to combat no-shows and travelers are not going to like it.
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Hertz makes renting a car even worse
Renting a car has always been a process filled with fees and added charges. You have to decide whether to take the insurance and decide whether you want to prepay for gas you may not use or opt to return it full, often not knowing if there's a gas station near the airport.
Add in the persistent efforts to upsell you to a nicer car and it's a pretty unpleasant experience that generally involves waiting, manually signing a lot of paperwork, and then walking to find a car that may or may not be where they say it is.
Hertz, however, has decided to make the process worse in an effort to cut down on no-shows. That's something View From the Wing's Garry Leff wrote about in a recent post.
"It makes sense to make more than one rental car booking, hoping that one will be honored when you get there! But rental car companies may be starting to put a stop to this. Bookings made directly with Hertz will now charge a no-show fee equal to the base rate for a day’s rental," he shared.
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Currently, this applies only to reservations made directly with the rental car company. That's due to the logistics of implementing it on third-party sites. So, for now, to avoid this potential fee, people can simply opt not to book directly with Hertz.
