Car rental rage: Why everyone’s losing it at the counter right now

Marcy Schackne is mad. 

She recently waited 2½ hours at LAX just to talk to a car rental agent. After completing her paperwork, she inspected three vehicles that were “beyond dirty” before finding one suitable to drive. 

A one-off? Nope. 

A few weeks later, when she tried to rent a sedan at Washington Dulles, she waited 45 minutes for a car in her reserved category. The agent’s attitude was “take it or leave it.”

“Both experiences made me feel undervalued as a customer,” she says. 

Schackne, a marketing executive from Hollywood, Fla., was understandably upset. And she’s got company. 

There’s a new kind of travel fury that’s erupting at counters everywhere: car rental rage. It’s the result of several unfortunate car rental problems, including hidden fees, cleaning charges that would make a hotel manager blush, and service that feels more adversarial than accommodating.

And drivers aren’t just getting mad. They’re getting even.

Why are travelers angry about car rentals?

Why is car rental rage so rampant right now? Three words: frustration, deception — and powerlessness.

Thomas Plante, a psychology professor at Santa Clara University, points to the “frustration-aggression hypothesis” to explain what’s happening. 

“Anger typically unfolds as a response to frustration and stress,” he says. “Travel has become more and more stressful in many ways. We seem to be getting less and less service for more and more costs and hassles. It’s a perfect recipe for frustration and stress that leads to aggression.” (Related: Your summer road trip just got 30 percent more expensive. Here’s how to fight back.)

The triggers are everywhere:

Aggressive upselling. Daniel Oppliger, a travel agency owner, encountered an agent at Phoenix who launched into a “10-minute spiel about insurance” despite his repeated refusals to purchase. “I said I would go elsewhere if she mentions insurance again,” he says. She did — and he left.

Bait-and-switch pricing. “Nothing is more irritating than the advertising done by car rental companies where they show the total price, only to find out it’s the total price before they add all the junk fees and taxes,” says Mark Beales, a retired mortgage banker from Mill Creek, Wash.

Unfair damage charges. Some car rental companies are using AI to scan every inch of your rental and bill you for even the smallest damage. “There is no set process to mutually determine what might be pre-rental damages,” says Sam Toles, a media consultant from Fort Lauderdale, Fla. “So I spend 20 minutes filming the car and photographing each portion of it in the event I return the vehicle and get dinged for a pre-existing ding.”

You don’t have to suffer all three to be furious at your car rental company.

How to know if you have car rental rage

One sign that you’re mad: You’re making car rental reservations you don’t intend to keep out of spite.

Car rental companies typically allow you to cancel reservations without a penalty. If you’re angry, that’s how you inflict damage on them. You make several reservations, which ties up their inventory and costs them money. Ouch!

In fact, if you find yourself arguing with a car rental employee after you return your car, it might be a sign of car rental rage. 

Sociologist Deborah Cohan, who has researched rage, notes that rental counter staff report “a noticeable increase in hostile exchanges” with customers arguing aggressively over fuel policies, cleaning fees, and mystery charges.

“There’s a lot of anger,” says Alen Baibekov, CEO of the car rental booking platform Economy Bookings. 

Car rental companies are hitting back

The anger goes both ways. Rental companies are fighting back with their own arsenal:

• Stricter cleaning standards. Baibekov explains that “cleaning standards were raised so sand, pet hair, glitter, or vaping smells can trigger deep clean fees.”

• Massive security deposits. Deposits are tiered by vehicle class at some locations, typically $300 to $1,000.

• More surveillance technology. Tila Lee, a design consultant from Calgary, found a tracking device in her rental recently. When she asked a representative, he was baffled. “Not that I was being tracked,” she says, “but that I had found out.”

If the car rental rage starts to cost companies money, experts predict they’ll invent new fees to make up for the lost revenue. It’s a pattern that repeats itself in the travel industry all the time. But you can stop it.

How to break the car rental rage cycle

Don’t get mad. It won’t help. Start by reading the contract — that’s the agreement between you and the car rental company.

“Your arrangement with the car rental company is a contractual one,” explains attorney Danny Karon, who represents victims in consumer fraud cases. “If the company didn’t keep its end up, you could have a breach-of-contract claim, whether individually or as a class action, if your rental agreement doesn’t contain a forced-arbitration clause.”

Knowing your rights in advance can help, too. 

For example, you’re not obligated to buy the car rental company’s expensive insurance, regardless of what a car rental salesperson claims. “There’s a common misconception that travelers have to purchase auto insurance offered by rental car providers or even use their personal auto insurance for rental cars,” says Daniel Durazo, director of external communications at Allianz Partners USA. (In fact, travel insurance companies like Allianz sell standalone policies that cover rental cars and are significantly cheaper than insurance sold by car rental companies.)

You can also rent from a company with a reputation for treating its customers well. Several of the drivers I interviewed for this story said they preferred renting through blue-chip rental companies like Avis or Enterprise. It’s a little bit more expensive, but they don’t play games — and they won’t tick you off.

Finally, take a deep breath. Plante, the psychologist, says if you schedule a little extra time, you can get a little breathing room. And that might reduce the stress that leads to anger. 

The road ahead for car rental rage

Car rental rage isn’t going anywhere until the industry addresses its biggest problem: treating customers like suckers instead of human beings. 

Louis Ducret, founder of the digital insurance platform Eprezto, says the best way forward is full transparency. 

“Show the customer up front exactly what they’ll pay, what they’ll get,” he says. “Remove the guesswork.”

Until that happens, we may be stuck in this cycle of mutual antagonism. Customers will keep fighting back with dirty returns, unused reservations and hostile reviews. Companies will respond with stricter policies and higher fees. And the rest of us will keep taking photos of rental cars like crime scene investigators.