Poor taste

I had an experience last night that has left a bad taste in my mouth as they say. I arrived into Minneapolis airport and proceeded to the car rental counter to get the keys for my pre-reserved rental car. I end up renting cars fairly often and frequently end up with one particular company because they end up being cheaper in many places I go to. I am no stranger to this company.

Upon arrival at the counter the on duty employee asked me for me id and credit card. She then proceeded to ‘offer me’ several variations of upgrades. She even used terms like “XX kind of car looks a lot more like your style, and for only YY dollars more we can put you into that car for your rental period.” That was followed with a question about which airline I flew in on, and an offer of “We are also offering special discounts for passengers of ZZ airline, which would make that upgrade only X dollars. Would you be interested in that?”

After stating several times that I only wanted the car I had booked and becoming somewhat annoyed and therefore more insistent, she went to go get the keys. She then came back and said “I’m sorry, we are all out of the car you booked. We can offer you a minivan (which are normally outrageously expensive to rent, especially in this location) instead for the same price. Is that ok with you?”

She had tried to get me to pay more for their mistake. They oversold a particular type of car and she was trying to con me into paying for an upgrade that they were going to have to give me anyways. And then instead of giving me the next level up, she gave me one of their most expensive rental types, albeit a minivan, not a luxury car. So instead of a $50 car for the two days I need it, she gave me a car they charge $180 or more for that same two days. That right after the ‘upgrade’ she offered which was only going to cost me $15 more than the $50 I already had committed to.

The whole experience was handled poorly and left me with a bad taste in my mouth. I am going to call the company and find out what they are going to do in response to this. More to come on this in the future perhaps – depending on how they do/do not satisfy a now frustrated but fairly regular customer.