Well, I’ve been to a great deal of travel in my life, and I might have mentioned more hotel rooms than 95% of the population. In fact, I’ve been to cities over 99% of the population and been banned from more car rental agencies I care to remember. Why are you asking? Because at my company I put a lot of miles on rental cars, no, not because I’m afraid of flying, I’m actually a pilot, because I’m a retired franchisee, and when I build my company I drive from city to city, and I don’t take a lot of planes because I make a lot of stops along the way.
I can remember one time I rented a car in Georgia, and it drove 48,000 miles in five weeks. In fact, I rented the car for $260 a week. You can imagine when I returned the car how shocked and angry they were, and how they wanted to use my credit card for another $10,000. However, I made them stick to $260 a week, told them that was the deal, that’s what I signed up for, and it wasn’t my fault that I ran their car through 26,000 miles, which is generally the point they trade in the car because they have a deal with the auto auction.
You can understand that putting nearly 50,000 miles on a car in five weeks and half of its useful life and paying just over $1,200 is obviously costing the rental car company a lot of money. They lost, and I won, but that was the deal. In fact they felt as though I had been taken advantage of by them, and banned for life from ever renting a car from that company again. Over the years, similar, though not so mileage, scenarios have happened. I am currently blocked by four different car rental companies, my entire life.
You may laugh, but it’s not very funny because car rental agencies and brand names often merge, and there are not as many as before, so now there are only a few that I can rent from. Suffice it to say that I recommend that you try not to take advantage of the Rent-A-Car companies, but you can still get yourself the best deal.
Otherwise, you risk getting yourself banned from car rental companies as well, and this could hurt your ability to travel in the future. In fact, I’ve been to some airports where three-quarters of the rental car companies were without cars, and the only company left that had a car was, well, the one I was actually banned from renting at. Perhaps you will please think about all this and think about it.