Due to the CDP attached to my profile, I'm fairly loyal to Hertz (and have been a pres. circle member for quite some time).
In a previous post, I happily reported that I've had no billing dramas or faux damage reports, and while the latter is still true, there are some cracks starting to appear that I thought worth sharing.
Credit card surcharge
As most would know, the rules around merchants passing on credit card surcharges changed on 1 September 2017. Merchants can now only pass on a rate equal to their cost. If they were going to charge a flat rate for all cards (despite having different costs for debit vs credit vs amex) then they have to charge the lowest, not an average.
And yet Hertz try to get away with charging a flat 1.35% fee for all bookings. Given their immense size (I note that franchises have their own merchant accounts and may not achieve the same level of transaction volume) I would expect them to be on quite a competitive merchant rate.
I have raised this with their customer service team and they shrugged it off saying that 'of course we comply with all Australian laws' to which we went around in circles a few times, and so an email was sent off to the ACCC.
In returning a car to a franchise over the weekend, I raised this same point. The agent, who was fairly new, shrugged it off saying that was the rate they charge and that's all he could do.
His offsider end up giving me the dollar something out of petty cash.
A small victory for too much time.
If they want to reduce the credit card rate and up their car rental prices, then I'm fine with that, at least then I'm getting .8 the value of each dollar (based on US currency conversion) back by way of Gold points
Long story short, I would hope that others would also start to complain about this practice to encourage Hertz
to change their ways.
Credit card surcharge rules
600 Rewards Points after every 15 qualifying rentals
Another thing I noticed on my account was the absence of a free rental in recent months.
I sent through an email to Gold customer service asking about the missing free rental, and if they could tell me from what date that freebie should have been applied.
They added the points but ignored the second part of my email.
I replied once more and asked for a statement, as the date of the credit didn't show up on the online account history.
I was told that the benefit was an annualised benefit. Meaning that the clock starts from 1 Jan and resets Dec 31.
Last year I rented 23 times but this year only twice, meaning that instead of expecting another bonus day in another 6 rentals, I have to wait 13. This is apparently according to the terms of the program, which I have asked for them to point out where exactly, as this was news to me.
I had another read through their T&Cs but couldn't find any mention of this rule.
Will report back with their response.
In a previous post, I happily reported that I've had no billing dramas or faux damage reports, and while the latter is still true, there are some cracks starting to appear that I thought worth sharing.
Credit card surcharge
As most would know, the rules around merchants passing on credit card surcharges changed on 1 September 2017. Merchants can now only pass on a rate equal to their cost. If they were going to charge a flat rate for all cards (despite having different costs for debit vs credit vs amex) then they have to charge the lowest, not an average.
And yet Hertz try to get away with charging a flat 1.35% fee for all bookings. Given their immense size (I note that franchises have their own merchant accounts and may not achieve the same level of transaction volume) I would expect them to be on quite a competitive merchant rate.
I have raised this with their customer service team and they shrugged it off saying that 'of course we comply with all Australian laws' to which we went around in circles a few times, and so an email was sent off to the ACCC.
In returning a car to a franchise over the weekend, I raised this same point. The agent, who was fairly new, shrugged it off saying that was the rate they charge and that's all he could do.
His offsider end up giving me the dollar something out of petty cash.
A small victory for too much time.
If they want to reduce the credit card rate and up their car rental prices, then I'm fine with that, at least then I'm getting .8 the value of each dollar (based on US currency conversion) back by way of Gold points
Long story short, I would hope that others would also start to complain about this practice to encourage Hertz
to change their ways.
Credit card surcharge rules
600 Rewards Points after every 15 qualifying rentals
Another thing I noticed on my account was the absence of a free rental in recent months.
I sent through an email to Gold customer service asking about the missing free rental, and if they could tell me from what date that freebie should have been applied.
They added the points but ignored the second part of my email.
I replied once more and asked for a statement, as the date of the credit didn't show up on the online account history.
I was told that the benefit was an annualised benefit. Meaning that the clock starts from 1 Jan and resets Dec 31.
Last year I rented 23 times but this year only twice, meaning that instead of expecting another bonus day in another 6 rentals, I have to wait 13. This is apparently according to the terms of the program, which I have asked for them to point out where exactly, as this was news to me.
I had another read through their T&Cs but couldn't find any mention of this rule.
Will report back with their response.
