[NA]Car Rental charges[NA]

Let'sgoflying!

Let'sgoflying!

Touchdown! Greaser!
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west Texas
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Display name:
Dave Taylor
Just wondering what is:

Concession Recovery Fee
Customer Facility Charge
Energy Recovery Fee (in view that all the energy ie gas was provided by me)
County Surcharge 3.50/RNT

??
 

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Let'sgoflying! said:
Just wondering what is:

Concession Recovery Fee
Customer Facility Charge
Energy Recovery Fee (in view that all the energy ie gas was provided by me)
County Surcharge 3.50/RNT

??
Click to expand...

Translation: we compete on daily rate but screw the customer with fees.
 
It's like every other business. The utilities were the first to get away with it. Why is it I have to pay a separate "service delivery" rate for the electricity I use which oddly enough is about the same as my electrical charge? It isn't like I can walk into my local National Grid office and get bucket of electricity.
Airlines did the same thing until congress stepped in. Perhaps "truth in lending" should be extended to products as well.
 
My favorite is the "Regulatory Recovery Fee." We're going to invent an amount we believe to be the share of the cost of doing business that's attributed to regulatory compliance and tack it on after we use the falsely advertised base price.

Last time I bought Gas at MIEGS there were no fewer than 5 separate itemized taxes on each gallon.
 
Let'sgoflying! said:
Just wondering what is:

Concession Recovery Fee
Customer Facility Charge
Energy Recovery Fee (in view that all the energy ie gas was provided by me)
County Surcharge 3.50/RNT

??
Click to expand...

Concession Recovery Fee:

"Dear Mr. Car Rental Company,
The board of commisioners of XYZ county will tax you on a percentage of your revenue generated at XYZ airport. Deal with this cost as you wish, by either taking it out of your profits or passing it onto the consumer as a separate line item on the rental agreement."


Customer Facility Charge:

"Dear Mr. Car Rental Company,
XYZ Airport will be charging you rent for the counter space you utilize at XYZ Airport. Deal with this cost as you wish, by either taking it out of your profits or passing it on to the consumer as a separate line item on the rental agreement."


Energy Recovery Fee:

"Dear Mr. Car Rental Company,
As the local wholesale distributor of fuel and oil products, we will be charging you more for the products you use at your rental operation at XYZ airport due to the anticipated increase in cost of the products brought about by the recent activity of speculative investors in the crude oil market. Deal with this cost as you wish, by either taking it out of your profits or passing it on to the consumer as a separate line item on the rental agreement."


County Surcharge:

"Dear Mr. Car Rental Company,
The board of commissioners of XYZ county realize we already tax you on a percentage of your revenue generated at XYZ airport. But we need just a little bit more this year to balance the budget, so we will also be requiring a per rental charge of $3.50 per the emergency legislation we wrote and voted on at last week's meeting. Deal with this cost as you wish, by either taking it out of your profits or passing it onto the consumer (99% of whom are from out of town and will not vote for, or, more importantly, against us, in the next election) as a separate line item on the rental agreement."



"Dear Mr. Car Rental Company,

Thanks so much for that $15 per day rate on the compact car you gave me. I remember a few years ago it cost nearly $30 a day. You must really be running a much more efficient operation these days.

Sincerely,
Car renters everywhere"
 
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I give you... The Universal Service Fund:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Service_Fund

Paid by every single person who has a telephone. Supposedly to provide equal service to the rural areas as in the cities. Working well, isn't it?

Yep. Telecom is de-regulated and a free market. Suuuuuure it is. ;)

Or... how about that project years ago to set up your local Public Safety agency's 911 system to show your address... That was completed quite some time ago by those agencies, but funny... there's still an E911 charge on my phone bills. Hmm.

Or... our latest one here in Colorado. We won't raise vehicle taxes, but we'll add ... and no I'm not kidding here... Three separate line items...

Own Fee
Road Fee
Bridge Fee

Why? Colorado gives back Automotive Taxes off your State Income Tax. So to raise Net revenue, you have to levy a Fee.

Colorado also uses this loophole to get around our (controversial) law that says taxes must be voted on (called TABOR). Fees are not taxes according to the opponents of TABOR. (Which is still working its way though the courts.)

Fees have been popping up like daisies 'round here for years. Even funnier is they're not flat. They're ... wait for it ... based upon a percentage of your taxes paid.
 
Hotel bills have a ton of taxes too
-State tax
-local tax
-occupancy tax
-arena tax
and so forth
 
They have high rental car "fees" here in Jackson.. Those fees are based on a rental and not on a mileage basis.. Thank god.... Back in 2002 during the 'offseason' the major rental companies offer a " getaway" unlimited mileage special during the spring shoulder season...I needed to go the Fla for Sun& Fun, visit some friends and pick up my motor from the race shop where it got balanced... So,,,, I go to the terminal and quiz each company on their charges. fees and terms... I picked the one with the best rates and asked several times to comfirm it was really unlimited.. Made them put it in writing and took the Chevy Tahoe for 8 days, Sunday night to the next Sunday night.... 199.00 + 80 bucks in fees... You should have seen the eyes on the check in gal who added up the mileage... 6015 miles..:yikes::yikes::D
 
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Concession Recovery Fee
- Basic cost of operating their business broken out so they can falsely advertise a lower price.

Customer Facility Charge
- Basic cost of operating their business broken out so they can falsely advertise a lower price.

Energy Recovery Fee (in view that all the energy ie gas was provided by me)
- Basic cost of operating their business broken out so they can falsely advertise a lower price.

County Surcharge 3.50/RNT
- Per-rental tax imposed by the county.

I don't mind companies separating out actual taxes but feel it is wrong to advertise a price and then add on additional charges to cover their cost of doing business. It's like a supermarket having one price on the shelf and when you get to the register, they add a "regulatory recover fee (to cover their cost of getting building permits for their stores), and a fuel surcharge (to cover the cost of fuel for their trucks). I don't understand why the FTC (or FCC for cell phones) allows it.
 
OK what is our tact to counter this deceit going to be?
Just got notice that Visa is tacking on a fee to all merchants. The fee has an equally ethereal name to the car rental fee names.
 
You could sue 'em for fraud...
 
I've always wondered about the additional driver fee. If I don't take the rental company's insurance, why do they care if my wife drives the car. Sometimes that fee is $15/day -- I don't pay it and don't worry about who drives. It doesn't matter if I wreck the car or she does, we're still paying for it (actually our car insurance is).
 
They separate all the fees out so they can be the lowest price when you look up a car on the internet.
 
denverpilot said:
Or... how about that project years ago to set up your local Public Safety agency's 911 system to show your address... That was completed quite some time ago by those agencies, but funny... there's still an E911 charge on my phone bills. Hmm.
Click to expand...

They aren't quite finished with Phase 2 E911. In the beginning it was land line based. Phone number was tied to a specific address. Enter cell phones. Phase 1 just got your number to our screen with the address being the cell tower your phone hit. Phase 2 is the GPS location part so we could conceivably find you if you dialed on your cell and couldn't speak. Sometimes it works, some times not.

And they are gearing up for NG911. Next Gen. That will allow you to text 911. And in the future there will be face to face 911. Texting is gonna be a major PITA. Sometimes is a chore trying to get the info I need when I'm talking to you. And what happens when the caller doesn't speak English? Using a translation service is bad enough, i cannot imagine having to text that.

Hopefully I'll be retired when it gets to the live video part. No way in hell I want anyone to actually see me. Then I'd have to behave.
 
DeeG said:
They aren't quite finished with Phase 2 E911. In the beginning it was land line based. Phone number was tied to a specific address. Enter cell phones. Phase 1 just got your number to our screen with the address being the cell tower your phone hit. Phase 2 is the GPS location part so we could conceivably find you if you dialed on your cell and couldn't speak. Sometimes it works, some times not.

And they are gearing up for NG911. Next Gen. That will allow you to text 911. And in the future there will be face to face 911. Texting is gonna be a major PITA. Sometimes is a chore trying to get the info I need when I'm talking to you. And what happens when the caller doesn't speak English? Using a translation service is bad enough, i cannot imagine having to text that.

Hopefully I'll be retired when it gets to the live video part. No way in hell I want anyone to actually see me. Then I'd have to behave.
Click to expand...

When the resources are not constrained, there is no incentive to be innovative or conserve resources.
 
Houston? It looks so familiar...

And yeah, it's legal as long as they disclose before contract, and yeah, it's so their rental rate looks lower than it really is.

BTW, the "concession recovery fee" is essentially passing on to you the fee the airport charges on each rental they make from the airport facility -- same way FBO's pass on the airport's "flowage fee" for fuel pumped by the FBO. The "customer facility charge" is passing on to you what the airport charges them for renting space in the combined rental car facility where all the rental companies are forced to locate on the airport. The county surcharge is the county obtaining its cut (you see that on hotel bills all the time) to help pay to operate the county's visitor/convention bureau. And the energy recovery fee? :dunno: Maybe it's their share of the heat and light bill for that rental car facility.

No different than when you buy a car and on top of the price of the car they tack on dealer prep, freight from the factory, etc.
 
Ron Levy said:
No different than when you buy a car and on top of the price of the car they tack on dealer prep, freight from the factory, etc.
Click to expand...

I successfully negotiated those away on my last vehicle. Actually I said, "Here's my bottom line price. By that I mean this will be the final amount paid. If you have fees or other silliness to put on the sales invoice, when you total them all up, they'd better equal this number or I get up and walk out the door, and you've lost a sale." I added that I knew taxes weren't included.

There is much more to this story, but unrelated to this. That dealer either barely broke even or lost money.

Same thing at the previous dealer which was even easier. I sent three dealers who had the car Karen wanted, a fax. It had a bottom line price on it also with similar "no fees" stipulations. I had a call back in 30 minutes asking for $80 more from the Internet Sales/Fleet manager at a dealer 100 miles away. (They had no idea what to do with a faxed offer other than give it to the "Internet" guy.)

Done deal. See you Saturday to pick it up and sign the paperwork.

Little harder to do these tactics when renting a car. But one could always try... worst they can do is say no, and offer a higher price. Always better to negotiate from the bottom up in highly competitive businesses like cars. They don't get offended at low balling like airplane owners do.

Always have had the best luck negotiating with Enterprise. If not negotiating, Fox Rent A Car and turn down all of their goofy add-ons. "I want wheels, not a GPS! Have one of those already here in my pocket!" ;)

Funnest car rental was an online deal from some off-airport guy who did his advertising through Priceline and all those websites. He had about six cars. When I arrived he said the car I'd rented hadn't come back in yet but he had a little Ranger pickup he'd do for the same price. Nobody would take it because they wanted their luggage inside. I told him I was by myself and it could go in the seat. Took off and drove it 100 miles from there to a conference. Had a blast. Think I paid $60 for the entire week. Ha. $49.95 plus tax. No airport or other fees because he wasn't on the airport. Just a little lot on a side street in California. Cost me more to fuel the thing than to rent it. ;)
 
Add-on fees; electrical company, phone company, rental cars, 100LL.........
unless there is some check and balance to prove these companies are never charging more than the purported costs laid on them, I am guessing it is a nice little cash cow for them.
 
I know I'm digging up the past, but I just reserved a rental car and the charges reminded me of this thread.

Enterprise at ORD:

250.68 USD (1 Week @ 250.68)
0.00 USD (Drop Charge)
28.40 USD (CONCESSION RECOVERY FEE 11.10 PCT)
40.00 USD (CUSTOMER FACILITY CHARGE 8.00/DAY)
5.15 USD (VEHICLE LICENSE RECOVERY 1.03/DAY)
2.75 USD (LESSOR TAX 2.75 USD/RNTL)
14.21 USD (AUTO RENTING OCCUPATION TAX)
17.05 USD (MPEA TAX)
2.84 USD (MASS TRANSIT TAX)
22.74 USD (CHICAGO TRANSACTION TAX)

Total Charges 383.82 USD
 
Matthew said:
I know I'm digging up the past, but I just reserved a rental car and the charges reminded me of this thread.

Enterprise at ORD:

250.68 USD (1 Week @ 250.68)
0.00 USD (Drop Charge)
28.40 USD (CONCESSION RECOVERY FEE 11.10 PCT)
40.00 USD (CUSTOMER FACILITY CHARGE 8.00/DAY)
5.15 USD (VEHICLE LICENSE RECOVERY 1.03/DAY)
2.75 USD (LESSOR TAX 2.75 USD/RNTL)
14.21 USD (AUTO RENTING OCCUPATION TAX)
17.05 USD (MPEA TAX)
2.84 USD (MASS TRANSIT TAX)
22.74 USD (CHICAGO TRANSACTION TAX)

Total Charges 383.82 USD
Click to expand...

Don't know how much it would cost to cab it outside the grip of Chicago and/or the airport, but it looks like you could save $75 or so if you rented from an off-airport location outside the city.

I do that on a regular basis, especially in Europe. Did it last week to rent a car to retrieve my airplane from annual. Saved $15 over renting it at DCA.
 
omg, if that isn't illegal it's at least insane.

I know I'm digging up the past, but I just reserved a rental car and the charges reminded me of this thread.
Enterprise at ORD:
250.68 USD (1 Week @ 250.68)
0.00 USD (Drop Charge)
28.40 USD (CONCESSION RECOVERY FEE 11.10 PCT)
40.00 USD (CUSTOMER FACILITY CHARGE 8.00/DAY)
5.15 USD (VEHICLE LICENSE RECOVERY 1.03/DAY)
2.75 USD (LESSOR TAX 2.75 USD/RNTL)
14.21 USD (AUTO RENTING OCCUPATION TAX)
17.05 USD (MPEA TAX)
2.84 USD (MASS TRANSIT TAX)
22.74 USD (CHICAGO TRANSACTION TAX)
Click to expand...
 
Our local newspaper ran an article about costs to businesses at the local shopping mall. Several business owners were complaining publicly that they didn't just have to pay rent, but the mall hit them with all kinds of fees. Telephone line fee, proportional share of heating a/c of common area, maintenance, etc. A guy I work with has a shop there and agreed that it was expensive, but didn't bother him because it was just the cost of doing business. They could remove the line-item fees, but then they'd have to add the costs to the rent.
 
Happens at most medium plus airports. If you can get off airport conviently it can save a lot. Cancun, MX a bus to Playa Del Carmen for USD 8 saved 80% on the rental.
 
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