This summer/autumn I briefly moved from Florida to Alabama. While there, I learned that, at Enterprise, you cannot rent a car on a debit card with an out of state license. When I decided it was time to head back to Florida, I googled AND called other rental agencies to learn their policies regarding out of state licenses, and determined that Budget/Avis would accept the combination.
The closest Avis location to me was the airport. I wasn't sure where I was going to figuratively land once back in Florida, so I chose a municipal airport at which to drop the car off. Picking it up, however, was a tight timeline - pick it up at 8am, meet the movers who quoted me "some time between 8 and 9am," get that thrown into storage, meet with the leasing office to sign final paperwork, etc, etc, etc.
I get to the airport, walk up to the counter, and the woman asks me for my outgoing flight information from drop off. I told her I didn't have an outgoing flight, and she told me that to rent and return to an airport, on a debit card, regardless of state ID, they REQUIRE flight information to rent a car, and she's so sorry but maybe the local Enterprise can assist.
At this point, I'm over the world. I've just reached the culmination of a high stress week, I'm up and functional at least 4 hours before I normally am (third shift), and the ONLY thing keeping me from making it through to the end is the lack of an airline ticket? Got it. I wander over to a seat, look up the cheapest flight out of the Florida airport I can find, book it, and take my information back up to the counter.
I walk up and say, "Seems to me this is the path of least resistance."
She looks at me, looks at my flight information, looks back at me and exclaims, "Ma'am! I know you're not getting on that flight!" I just look at her. Finally she goes, "I'll do it for you this time, but we're not supposed to ."
As soon as I got in the car I cancelled the flight. They refunded half. I consider that $45 a convenience fee.
Next time you are in this situation, check if there is a U-Haul location near you.
They'll rent a pickup truck for around $20/day, plus mileage.
And they are very used to one-way rentals...
This legitimately occurred to me AFTER my move! And they don't require a huge deposit!
For sure- but do know going in that the $20/day is not for one-way rentals; those are significantly more pricey. But often still more feasible than renting a regular car one-way.
LOL This is what I do whenever I need a rental. 20 dollars a day for a pickup. I get one whenever my car is in the shop for more than a day.
U-Haul is awesome. I haven't used them that often but never had any trouble when I did. Plus, they were friendly.
An inconvenience fee, ammirite?
(I'll be here all night.. or at least until my flight leaves.)
ngl that sounds like the wildest car rental saga ever lol like who needs that stress right
Dude! You know you ain't getting on that flight!
My wife ran into this a few years ago. We were out of town and a family emergency occurred, so she decided to rent a car to drive home (leaving me, the children, and the kids’ friends at the beach.) The only place that had ‘one way’ cars in stock was the airport. No mention of any ‘ticket’ bullshit until we arrived at the counter. A stern discussion of ‘rules at the counter’ versus ‘no bullshit rule online…’ got her a car.
Why would the need, or even expect, the customer to have a plane ticket when they're renting a car for one way? It seems to me that that pretty clearly suggests that they're driving to their destination and staying there, not flying.
Why do they expect an outgoing ticket? They should expect a ticket for the plane they just got off of.
They don't. I've rented cars at airports without flying many times, from various companies, as have several friends and coworkers.
They generally don't rent cars on debit cards at all unless you have the ability to put a substantial amount of money up as collateral for them to hold.
I booked an entire vacation with my debit card online. Flight, hotel, car etc. Go to pick up the car & they required a credit card at the counter. No amount of argument was accepted. I didn't take a credit card because I'd already booked & paid with my debit card. I thought it was a done deal. We were half way across the country & no car. Finally found a rental agency at the airport that would rent using debit. What difference does it make? You're less likely to get a charge back with a debit card IMO.
The difference is that most major credit cards include rental car insurance.
Something similar happened to my brother. Reserved car online thru airport location. Went to pickup the car. Showed driver's license. Was informed that because home address was within 150 miles of airport, there would be an extra fee hold to his debit. Paying with credit, no such charge. Like, who comes up with these policies? Completely arbitrary. 150 miles means you're subject to an extra fee? 151 miles and you're fine? GTFOH with that. So random and dumb.
Have had a vendetta against Enterprise for almost 20 years now over this policy. Military guy stationed in Jersey, but obviously didn’t change legal residency in every state they moved me to. Fast forward to my car being in the shop and had a vacation planned, just needed to rent one to drive home and befell the evil of those turds. Now I make it a point to flip them the freedom birds and yell out the window at every one I pass by. Get some strange looks, but they deserve it I guess.
As an ex professional traveler for work (and ex military also) they all are shit.
Advice for everyone:
-All rental car companies hate debit cards, worse card you can use to rent with. First time I ever rented a car I had to pay $300 deposit up front just because I was using a debit card back in the early 90's. Only thing they hate more then a debit card is cash. I know not everyone has a credit card but even a low credit high interest rate card is better then a debit card to rental car companies. Get that emergency credit card if you can.
-Sign up for the rewards programs, it gives you better standing. Look for discount codes on line you can use, you'll get a better price on the cars and I haven't seen them update the codes. As an example I have Avis discount code I got from a coworker that he had used it for multiple years through various companies and is still valid today close to 15 years after I got it from him and used for multiple companies.
-Depending on the rental car company rewards program might let you bypass the whole checkout at the booth. I'm an Enterprise Emerald member and just go crawl in whatever car I like at the airport in my Emerald level I'm currently in and drive off the lot. Only human interaction I have is at the exit gate where they look at my DL, ask a few questions and I'm off to do whatever. This is again an airport rental thing.
-Generally airport rental centers is cheaper than in town. This is the first I've heard of needing flight information so don't know how common that is. That said traveling for work leaves you with a long rental car history so that might be why I've never ran into the problem.
-Do not use one of those travel sites unless you have rock solid travel plans as they are not flexible. Best bet is to use the rental car app to rent with, that goes for hotels too.
-Do not call at the last minute to cancel your rental as most have fees dealing with cancellation at the last minute. Call and reschedule your rental to a later date, make a believable excuse that includes how work schedule has changed requiring putting off the rental. Once that is accepted then call back and cancel your rental, this works with hotels too. Most have rules against cancelling with under 24 hours (read the cancellation policy before calling) call and reschedule past the cancellation policy plus some extra time. Call back the next day and cancel, likely get someone else on the call line and even if not and they actually remember you make the excuse the trip ended up being cancelled due to rescheduling due to the delay.
-Do not use travel apps like travelocity or kayak. Yeah you might get better rates but they are not flexible and screw you big time if plans have to change. Deal directly with plane, car rental and hotels, they are much more flexible. As an example you use travelocity to plan a trip and your connecting flight is delayed. or cancelled. You can call travelocity probably wait an obscene amount of time, pay more to change your plans and not get any traveling vouchers. Or you can use an airline app to plan your trip then use the app to see whatever flights fit your delay (or use the airline customer service desk) for free. Change your hotel plans for free using their app or customer service number and change your rental car plans for free. Yeah you might not get the cheapest of cheapest of cheapest rates but you are in charge of your own plans.
This is top-tier advice.
I've done the rearrange-and-then-cancel trick a few times to save on cancellation fees.
I only use travel websites like kayak to find the best price, then book on the actual company's site.
This interests me. WHY?
1) Why do they hate debit cards? They run the card, they have the money.
2) Why do they hate cash even more? Just 'cuz they have to handle it??
I've seen both of the opposite situations at, of all places, a food court:
a) One place that took cash (and checks!), but refused cards and phone apps.
b) Another place that refused cash, took ccards and app payments only.
One of those is certainly based on fees; the other ... I have no idea.
Because of incidentals - you damage the car, overmiles, return late, low fuel on return, etc. Costs are variable and with a credit card they have an easier way to get the extra costs from you than debit cards or cash
Car rentals at airports in Australia and NZ are much more expensive than downtown locations. The airports slug a fee (15% to 20%) for the entire rental. Definitely worth it to catch the bus or even a taxi to off-airport site for longer rentals.
Depends on the city here in the US. In small cities with an airport generally it's cheaper at the airport. Off airport locations usually have very few cars and have to transport cars from the airport to their lot if rentals exceed stock then transfer back again when rental is turned in. I don't think I ever saw more than a dozen cars on the lot at any time I drove by.
I generally didn't rent away from airports in large cities because I was flying into them and would just grab a car there except during COVID. Rentals became obnoxious to come up with so I would be checking every lot in town to see if they had a car available and yeah, often it was cheaper away from the airport.
Oh yeah, one more travel trip and rental cars. If they show no cars available for a short rental of a couple days search for a week or two long rental and frequently a car would magically become available. Rent it and turn it back in when you're done in two days. Their is verbiage about fees for turning in a rental early but I've never been charged an early turn in fee. Had to learn to do this during COVID.
Did she seem a little flighty?
She knows how to TAKE the reservation..she just can't HOLD the reservation...and that's the most important part...the Hold
Props to the OP — he was able to wing it.
First class story, even.
Especially for these turbulent times.
Too bad for his economy though
Real question, and not American so maybe I'm missing something, why do people still use debit?
I guess I'm not quite sure why I wouldn't still use a debit card. No sarcasm, but it's the equivalent of paying cash and it pulls directly from my bank account and it doesn't affect my credit. What would you use?
Credit cards have more protections than debit and often come with incentives to use them e.g. flat cash back and travel rewards, etc. Mostly the former is important to me though. I’ve had to file chargebacks a handful of times and credit cards make the process easy.
Not in my country.
Also, the credit card limit is counted as if you have a loan for that amount when calculating the maximum mortgage you can take which almost bit me in the ass when I was buying an apartment.
Never had a need to try doing a chargeback so dunno about that.
Interesting, definitely a US-centric response from my end, but OP seems to be in the US too. Yeah, chargebacks have been very helpful to me. Once, a business I had just bought a subscription from went out of business a week after I bought it. I submitted a chargeback and got my money back. Another time, a business promised me they wouldn't charge me this extra fee and I had written proof. Of course, later they did charge me the fee. I submitted a chargeback with the e-mail and got my fee back.
Those protections come out of the merchant's payment, making goods and services more expensive for everyone. I've noticed more and more small businesses offering cash discounts as fees climb, but so far no major business has been brave enough to fight the credit card companies by doing so.
If your debit card is compromised, the money that's gets stolen is yours. You have to convince someone at the bank get your money back for you.
In the meantime, you immediately have no money. If they can't get the money back, you lose the money, just as if someone had taken paper money from you.
If your credit card is compromised, they have stolen the credit card company's money.
You still have whatever money you had and can still get cash or probably charge a flight or whatever.
The credit card company will investigate and if the charge is bogus and they can't recover the money, they lose their money, not yours.
Edit - sorry for the bad writing. I'm my defense I was left unsupervised after I had surgery and shouldn't have been allowed on the Internet until the meds wore off.
This. Debit cards terrify me.
It doesn’t build your credit either. If you inherited your home and you always pay cash, in full, for your vehicles then no/low credit score may not be an issue for you. Responsible credit card use, paying off the balance instead of the minimum amount every month, will build your credit score. The higher your credit rating the lower your interest rates on big ticket purchases such as cars or a house.
No, I know the purpose of credit. I have a credit card. I chose not to use it this time. I'm just super curious at the implication that debit cards are out of fashion outside of the US. Like, I cannot wrap my head around not having and using a debit card at all ever.
I am from Sweden and I only own a debit card since I was of the age to get one, which is even earlier than you can get a credit card. At the moment I have no reason to use a credit card, I prefer to live of money I have now than future money.
I'm in Sweden and have been using only credit cards for many years. I know how much money I have / get in salary so I never spend more than I have and pay the complete bill every month. There are various benefits with the credit card that makes it valuable for me. But I know a lot of people use debit cards only.
This might have been completely different for us if the whole money part and such was taught in school, but it isn't.
We definitely use debit cards a lot where I live (Northern Europe). I've no idea where that other person is from.
So you were at wits end and rather than just use a CC you went out of your way to spend more?
For the purposes of this story, I’m assuming OP didn’t have a credit card at the time.
I literally replied to op's comment that they 'chose' to not use the CC....
Yeah it only makes sense if you assume they didn’t have a credit card lol. Why else would anyone waste $50 on a plane ticket. 😭🤣 crazy
Fraud protections on debit cards are weaker. If your debit card number gets stolen, they can literally empty your bank account, and depending on the strength of the protections provided by your institution, the range of what you might have to pay for the fraud can be a minimum of $50 all the way up to the full amount stolen.
Major credit cards also usually include some degree of rental car insurance, which is why rental car companies want your card.
In short, best practice is probably to use your debit card only in small, offline transactions and for ATM withdrawals. The rest should be done on a credit card, and only when you can guarantee you can pay off the amount charged ASAP.
Also, the emergency debit card I keep in my wallet is connected to a checking account where I only keep a nominal amount of money.
They're lending you a car. You could have the amount for the rental but not for damages or other things they can bill you for if you break your contract with them. They assume you have at least $500 open to buy on a credit card which is why they specify they need a credit card on file.
Some car rental companies will accept a debit card but they require you to have a balance of like $300 in your account and they put a hold on those funds until you return the vehicle. I found that out the hard way visiting friends over a weekend. I either didn't hear them or didn't read what I signed about the hold and ended up with hardly any money to spend.
Cannot get a credit card. Sometimes bad credit, sometimes no credit history. There are many reasons.
Because I can only spend what I have. For a myriad of reasons, every time I've had a credit card I end up in debt paying bazillions in interest.
Because it's your own money and you're not paying interest on it?
Because credit cards charge interest/fees and debit cards just take the money directly out of your account.
If you pay it off monthly or right away then no interest. Plus plenty of no fee credit cards out there. Much better consumer protection than debit too.
I have to think about the payment if I use a CC, if I use debit I don’t. Some debit cards now offer cash back bonuses too.
I encourage you to take a second look at credit cards. Especially the ones that pay you back for usage. I have one that I've hooked up to all my monthly utilities. Cable / Electricity / Garbage. They all auto-pay on the credit card. Every year I get money back that I kinda use as a Christmas Account.
This year I got $800 back from Citi and $500 back from Amazon (I spend way too much at Amazon lol).
That's money I would not have gotten back if I'd used a debit card.
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That sounds reasonable for an employer who might have an employee try to overspend. In that case the charges wouldn't be fraudulent and it would be on the company to claw back money from the employee. It sounds like a good way to limit the damage.
I think it's worth adding that for individuals, credit cards offer excellent protection. A cardholder can reverse charges against companies who do not deliver on their promises. If the credit card or its number are stolen and fraudulent transactions are made, the cardholder can contact the issuer and will not be held responsible for those fraudulent charges.
That's exactly backward. Liability on a card is de facto $0 (theoretically $50 but no issuer enforced that). Debit card: good luck getting it back.
Tried renting a van one time, was told none were available and I would need a reservation. Went online, made a reservation for that location, and still told none were available.
What's the point of a reservation if they don't honor it?
That is the craziest thing. Sorry I had to go through that sometimes companies seem to go out out of their way to make it difficult for the consumers.
I got stranded at the PITT airport because the Budget lady cancelled my rental after the phone rep assured me I only needed my debit card and license.
They have to give full refunds within 24 hours
I don't think that rule applies for flights that are departing within 1 week of booking date.
I find it bizarre that there isn't a universal driving licence in USA, like there is here in UK.
The US is 50 countries in a trenchcoat. The federal government's purpose is to deal with international issues and disputes between states.
So, IDs, driving licenses, doesn't apply.
The Constitution of the US gives the Federal government specific powers, under law. A license to drive was not one of them. Congress can create legislation granting the Federal government power to do so, but never did. One big reason why was that they did not want to create a national ID.
So, going down, this meant the states were able to do so since there is no Federal legislation disallowing it (or contradicting it), if they chose to do so through their own state constitutions, which they did. You can read more about this waterfall effect of legislation by looking into enumerated powers.
And decades later, we now have a pseudo national ID through the REAL ID system, whereby states are now working with Federal agencies providing them state ID info to validate identities and legal status.
I’d just park the car in their parking lot and leave it with photo documentation of it being in their custody, and the keys on the counter. Tell them it’s their problem whether they like it or not. I’d even be willing to report my debit card stolen so they have nothing to charge to.
Off the top of my head: “Oh, sorry. Delta flight 375.”
So weird. In 2019 I was in the states and had no issues with Enterprise. Used my licence from my home country and paid with a debit card from a bank from my home country too. No issue whatsoever. And from the comments it seems that this is a common problem. Maybe they do things a little differently in Kentucky.
Should have booked a fully refundable ticket so you’d get all the money back.
A rental agent at O'Hare airport charged me a $500 deposit because I had a local home address. I don't think buying a plane ticket wpuld have helped.
He explained that they have problems with local renters not returning the car on time and/or dropping the car off at a different location even though a one-way rental wasn't approved. Their risk is much lower when renting to people who have to bring the car back to the airport to catch their flight.
I rent at our local airport ALL THE TIME because I can pick up and drop off both really early or late ANY day of the week. When I book online and it asks for my incoming flight number I just put in whichever Alaska flight is coming it half an hour before I want to pick up. (Because my airport has about 40 incoming Alaska flights every day). I’ve NEVER had to show proof of purchase.
WTF? None of this makes any sense. It's all like navigating Soviet-style idiocracy.
If you have money (debit card, credit card, check, cash) that ought to be enough to rent a damned car. And if they won't, sue them. Because they're idiots. THEY WON'T TAKE MONEY!
This is a brilliant solution. Creativity like this should be applauded. Brava!
Car rentals are ridiculous with a debit card. Just insanity