run out of cars??

[jwcollin]

Has anyone ever been in the situation when you get to your destination and go to get your rental car and be told that they don't have any left in the size you booked? Do they just upgrade you automatically? We have never been caught that way, but I am nervous with booking a full size car and having 4 "largeish" suitcases and being told they only have compact cars left

 

[Tara]

Has anyone ever been in the situation when you get to your destination and go to get your rental car and be told that they don't have any left in the size you booked? Do they just upgrade you automatically? We have never been caught that way, but I am nervous with booking a full size car and having 4 "largeish" suitcases and being told they only have compact cars left

Sure, and I've always gotten a bigger car.

 

[Jestocost]

They will almost always upgrade you to a higher-priced car class at the same rate if they don't have what you had reserved. The problem comes if you've booked one of the larger vehicles to begin with and need that space, or when the higher-priced cars available are more luxurious, but not larger. All that said, the worst wait I have ever had was about an hour when I booked a van and needed the space, but they were out of vans or anything with comparable cargo capacity. And that was in Norfolk, a much less busy airport with a much smaller rental car inventory than MCO.

 

[SilverMickey]

2 years ago we had a compact car reserved. Everyone did as that was a time of horrendous gas prices... The company didn't have any left for my family. They said I could wait until one got checked in (up to 2 hours) or I could pick from the lot. The guy took a break from behind the counter and walked me around the garage to show me a minivan with 8 miles on it, HUMMER 3, several convertibles, sports cars...blah blah blah.

Well we had really wanted a van so 2 families could travel together for a wedding and other functions to do with the wedding. The price of VANS were out of this world!

Needless to say I accepted the van and paid 134 and change for a minivan for 2 weeks.

I would say you don't have to worry about a down grade...

 

[justplaingoofy]

Its like the old Seinfeld episode...

You take the reservation..... you just can't hold..the reservation...

yes, been Upgraded, never downgraded.

I think once the car rental agency "knows" they do not have the available cars they try to "upsell" people that day that are in that category or may try to get you to upgrade to a higher category. Once you tell them no thank you, they will likely put you in that category anyway.

 

[kaytieeldr]

All that said, the worst wait I have ever had was about an hour when I booked a van and needed the space, but they were out of vans or anything with comparable cargo capacity. And that was in Norfolk, a much less busy airport with a much smaller rental car inventory than MCO.

Ha! I can beat that.

Try NO cars.
Period.
At 3:30 AM on a Friday, after wairing in line for almost two hours.
No credit card, so I can't use the kiosk.
Finally, second trip to the garage, there's ONE prepped car.

 

[n2mm]

Yes, we reserved a mid-size and there were none (National). I thought they would upgrade us....nope, they sent us to Alamo and told us to choose a mid-size there from that aisle instead. So that's what we did.

My friend who meets us in WDW a couple of times a year often comes in late and she has said on many occassions she arrives to an empty Emerald Aisle and has to wait for a car to arrive.

 

[Goofygirl17]

A couple of years ago we reserved a minivan with alamo and they didn't have any so we ended up with a jeep commander.

 

[justplaingoofy]

Has anyone ever been in the situation when you get to your destination and go to get your rental car and be told that they don't have any left in the size you booked? Do they just upgrade you automatically? We have never been caught that way, but I am nervous with booking a full size car and having 4 "largeish" suitcases and being told they only have compact cars left

What time do you arrive?

 

[DVC-Don]

A few times they've tryed to upsell to a higher class, but when I declined they upgraded me for free.

 

[Had2stopLurking]

There are a plethora of reasons rental companies can run out of cars. USUALLY, the person is upgraded at no charge, but, if there are no cars, there are simply no cars. We always tried to find a company to cover our reservations, but that wasn't always possible, so a customer might have to wait.

Reasons (the list is longer but, these are the ones that come to mind) for running out of cars:

Car returned with damage so must sit in the hold lot until it could get appraised.

Car returned with blood (yep, happened quite a few times) so had to sit in the hold lot to determine if it was animal/vegetable/mineral before we would allow our techs to touch it.

Cars NOT returned when they are supposed to be due to inclement weather.

Cars on the hold lot due to needing an oil change or something similar (I must admit, I would pull these cars and rent them, even if it meant putting off the oil change a week or so).

Car not returned but towed in due to someone smoking in it with a leaky propane tank (yep, I'm not kidding)

And my most favorite of non rentable returns was the one that came back with bullet holes in the side and the guy who rented it threw quite a few grand on the counter and said if that didn't cover the damage, just call him and he would take care of it; just don't call the police.

Those are just a few of the reasons car rental companies can't always count on cars being returned on time (I'm sure I have a ton more, but, those were my most favorite/memorable)

 

[justplaingoofy]

\
And my most favorite of non rentable returns was the one that came back with bullet holes in the side and the guy who rented it threw quite a few grand on the counter and said if that didn't cover the damage, just call him and he would take care of it; just don't call the police.

Those are just a few of the reasons car rental companies can't always count on cars being returned on time (I'm sure I have a ton more, but, those were my most favorite/memorable)

OMG.... bullet holes & he paid in cash...wonder what he does for a living? Guess that would be a memorable one!

 

[n2mm]

A few times they've tryed to upsell to a higher class, but when I declined they upgraded me for free.

Us too (Dollar). They kept pushing us to upgrade to a bigger car and we kept declining. Then they told us they didn't have our car size and upgraded us to a minivan for free (it was only the 2 of us?)

 

[DC7800]

Once had a standard car reserved at Enterprise, but they had far more 'standard' reservations than they actually had cars in that class. I got upgraded to a Chevrolet Tahoe.

 

[Luv2Diz]

Twice we reserved a car with Alamo at MCO and got to the garage and there was no car in our class available. No upgrades were offered. We had to just stand there in the garage for 10 minutes the first time and 20 minutes the second (really fun in the heat of September after a 7 hour flight!) and wait for a car in our class to be cleaned and brought around.

I was thankful on my most recent trip that there were actually a whopping 4 cars in my chosen class to select from!

 

[Had2stopLurking]

OMG.... bullet holes & he paid in cash...wonder what he does for a living? Guess that would be a memorable one!

I'm sure he was a very upstanding member of society with a lot of extra cash on his hands . If the owner of the franchise was happy with getting the repairs paid for, who was I to question this nice young man?????

 

[bwilcox]

Its like the old Seinfeld episode...

You take the reservation..... you just can't hold..the reservation...

...and that's really the most important part of the reservation, the holding. Anybody can just take them

 

[jwcollin]

What time do you arrive?

We fly in at 11:30pm. We have done this before, but was traveling lighter then. So really we weren't concerned about trunk space. This time more luggage, we need to make sure there is the space. Minivans and SUV's are out of this world in price!!!