Path: utzoo!mnetor!tmsoft!dptcdc!sickkids!mark
From: mark@sickkids.UUCP (Mark Bartelt)
Newsgroups: comp.org.decus
Subject: Car rental at Atlanta symposium
Message-ID: <147@sickkids.UUCP>
Date: 6 Apr 89 09:54:25 GMT
Reply-To: mark@sickkids.UUCP (Mark Bartelt)
Distribution: na
Organization: Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto
Lines: 55

I note, with a combination of dismay and amusement, that DECUS has,
for what presumably seemed like good reasons to whoever made the
decision, selected Alamo Rent A Car as the designated car rental
agency for the Atlanta symposium.  If you read rec.travel, you
undoubtedly recall the discussion a couple months ago about car
rental companies in general, and Alamo in particular.  A followup
posting by someone who started the whole discussion pretty much
says it all:

> Thank you all of you who posted your experiences with Alamo;
> there were a few other car rental agencies who got mildly
> blasted, but Alamo was considered, by far, the most underhanded
> dirty-dealing outfit.  There were even a few people who, when
> I mentioned that I had had a bad experience with a car rental
> agency, said: "Alamo, right?"

Some of the sleazy practices that people complained about included:

--  Unavailability of the class of automobile that the customer
    had reserved, coupled with substitution of more expensive
    cars, requiring that the driver pay the higher cost.  (Most
    other car rental companies, when making such a substitution,
    provide the larger car but honor the lower price that the
    customer was promised at reservation time.)

--  High-pressure badgering to buy the "optional" CDW, even when
    the drivers *knew* that they were covered by their personal
    insurance.

--  Attempts to charge customers for small dents and other sorts
    of minor damage that had been there before the car left the
    lot.  Plus the remarkable (and, in many people's views, rather
    suspicious) ability of their employees to zero in on these
    trivial pre-existing damages, as if they might be collecting
    on the same dent from customer after customer after customer.

--  A one-time, non-refundable fuel fee, where the customer gets
    charged approximately $2/gallon * gas_tank_capacity, but with
    the tank generally only half full.

So those of you who plan to rent a car in Atlanta might be well
advised to watch out.  I'd be curious to hear of any horrendous
experiences after the symposium.  As for me, I'll be taking MARTA.

By the way, it seems that Alamo is interested in renting only to
residents of the US:  Their 800 number doesn't work from Canada
(not unusual), but their advertisement in the DECUS registration
packet doesn't include any other telephone number which people
outside the range of their toll-free number might be able to use.

-----

Mark Bartelt                          UUCP: {utzoo,decvax}!sickkids!mark
Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto   BITNET: mark@sickkids.utoronto
416/598-6442                          INTERNET: mark@sickkids.toronto.edu