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> in this case its at least impartial and the scans are transparently available. Whenever I rent a car, after getting the keys I walk around the car and take p

> in this case its at least impartial and the scans are transparently available. Whenever I rent a car, after getting the keys I walk around the car and take photos of it on my phone from every angle. If I notice any scratches or dents, I tell them. But I still keep the photos, just in case. Then I do the same when I return it. That way if - at any point - they say I damaged the car, I have timestamped photos. It feels like an obvious, easy way to cover my arse if there's a dispute. Otherwise you're basically screwed if they claim you got the car scratched up. I'm really surprised other people don't do that. Its what my family has done from before we even had digital cameras.

pbbbt 1y ago
I do the same, but it didn't help me - Hertz charged me for several hundred dollars while I was flying back home, the same day after dropping off the car. Turns out, you can send them all the pictures you like - all they did was send me a work order for scratches + repaint in a poorly specified location, with no comment on the pictures. No amount of emails or phone calls asking them to indicate where on the car was supposedly scratched led to anything - I just got passed around and around... If my credit card insurance didn't cover it (Chase reimbursed me in full relatively easily), I would have taken the next step and did a chargeback. Maybe it would have been helpful if I needed to press the issue. But the presence of some tens of pictures between me and my wife didn't seem to accomplish much
- tcoff91 1y ago
  Your mistake was renting with Hertz. This is the same company that literally got their customers arrested for grand theft auto due to negligently reporting cars stolen that had in fact not been stolen.
  - const_cast 1y ago
    All rental car companies devolve into poorly-run scams. My pet theory is they're actually renting the cars at a loss to stay competitive, and then they need to con the money back to stay afloat.
    - tcoff91 1y ago
      Yeah but only Hertz mistakenly put many their customers in Jail. That’s a whole other level of incompetence.
- jppj 1y ago
  It's always good to have that paper trail for if it indeed does end up as a real dispute. Not car rental but a similar experience with eBay where a scammer shipped an item to an address in my city but not mine, apparently a common technique. I had DHL's email confirming this, and if thinking I doctored it it isn't a difficult call to DHL to verify, but all claims to both ebay and Paypal were denied despite definite proof. More than half a year later I finally got the charge back presumably thanks to having the paper trail for the credit card company. Naturally I closed both accounts after this experience (the whole point of PayPal was to have protection in these cases...) but I suspect almost all companies are optimized for reducing support costs even if it means just a few lost customers.
- josephg 1y ago
  If it went to arbitration, the photos would have helped. At the end of the day, it’s not really up to hertz whether hertz is breaking the law. It’s up to the small claims court. (Or whatever it’s called in your part of the world). Whether you can be bothered or not is of course another question.

pbbbt 1y ago

I do the same, but it didn't help me - Hertz charged me for several hundred dollars while I was flying back home, the same day after dropping off the car. Turns out, you can send them all the pictures you like - all they did was send me a work order for scratches + repaint in a poorly specified location, with no comment on the pictures. No amount of emails or phone calls asking them to indicate where on the car was supposedly scratched led to anything - I just got passed around and around... If my credit card insurance didn't cover it (Chase reimbursed me in full relatively easily), I would have taken the next step and did a chargeback. Maybe it would have been helpful if I needed to press the issue. But the presence of some tens of pictures between me and my wife didn't seem to accomplish much

tcoff91 1y ago
Your mistake was renting with Hertz. This is the same company that literally got their customers arrested for grand theft auto due to negligently reporting cars stolen that had in fact not been stolen.
- const_cast 1y ago
  All rental car companies devolve into poorly-run scams. My pet theory is they're actually renting the cars at a loss to stay competitive, and then they need to con the money back to stay afloat.
  - tcoff91 1y ago
    Yeah but only Hertz mistakenly put many their customers in Jail. That’s a whole other level of incompetence.
jppj 1y ago
It's always good to have that paper trail for if it indeed does end up as a real dispute. Not car rental but a similar experience with eBay where a scammer shipped an item to an address in my city but not mine, apparently a common technique. I had DHL's email confirming this, and if thinking I doctored it it isn't a difficult call to DHL to verify, but all claims to both ebay and Paypal were denied despite definite proof. More than half a year later I finally got the charge back presumably thanks to having the paper trail for the credit card company. Naturally I closed both accounts after this experience (the whole point of PayPal was to have protection in these cases...) but I suspect almost all companies are optimized for reducing support costs even if it means just a few lost customers.
josephg 1y ago
If it went to arbitration, the photos would have helped. At the end of the day, it’s not really up to hertz whether hertz is breaking the law. It’s up to the small claims court. (Or whatever it’s called in your part of the world). Whether you can be bothered or not is of course another question.