Safety, quality and billing issues.
Written: Feb 16 '05
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Last minute, the only compact out of the rental companies in that building. Clean interior.
Cons: Poor tire maintenance, lack of concern for safety. Bad radios in Ford Focus.
The Bottom Line: only if you like living on the edge!
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| opynyun8ed's Full Review: Payless Car Rental |
Feb.2005 San Jose, CA airport. It has rained basically all day long. Did not make reservations. This was a last minute, unplanned rental. Rented a Ford Focus for a week. The license plate didn't match the number on envelope nor did the keys activate the alarm. No big deal, attendant directed us to the OTHER Focus.
While doing the walk-a-round, I find that the two front tires are practically bald!!! (back tires are good) Again, it's been raining all day and the weather forecast is for rain all week. - We go back to rental counter and inform the rep. of the poor tread, the license plate discrepancy and we request another car. He says that the car was recently serviced and tires are rotated regularly. My response was, that if it was my car, I wouldn't be driving on those tires! There's hardly any tread. The guy seemed a little annoyed that we have a complaint and that we asked for another car. None-the-less, we say thank you and take the keys to the next car.
Upon inspecting the 2nd Focus (which matched the license plate number on the envelope), we find the front tires are good, but the back tires are practically bald. The tires are worn around the outer edges with more tread around the middle. Now even though the tires aren't to my satisfaction and the radio display has been broken so that nothing is visible, I figure based on the first response we received, I'm not going to get a better or different car,and I don't have the time to play change the cars all night it's 9pm and I need a car for tomorrow, so I take the car and my chances.
As I am driving away unhappy and leery, the breaks are squealing and the radio is breaking in & out (I figure the bad reception is because we're at the airport). NOT. The radio reception never changed. The radio could not be adjusted in ANY WAY. Volume, channel, on/off, Nothing!!! Now I can see why the LCD display is broke, someone probably punched it!
Later when I get home, I do two things, take another look at the tires and review my invoice. Then I get online to research tire safety and maintenance. According to the information I found, these tires should be out of commission because the wear bar is visible! When I reviewed my invoice, which isn't clearly printed in the proper columns, I see $175 but it doesn't specify if this is my total or not or even what it's for. All I know is that I was quoted $119 for a week so I'm confused.
So I take the car back the very next evening. I am helped by the same person as the previous evening. I stated that I was returning the vehicle. There were NO questions asked of me like, how was the car, did you have any problems, etc. Or even, why was I returning the car so soon. Nothing. He just processed the paperwork and handed me by summary. On my rental summary it showed $175 minus $142.50. My total for one day rental ended up being $32.05 for the worst rental I've ever had!
Why didn't I ask about the charges? I was just happy to be safe and to be released from my agreement with this company! I did however, complete a survey on their website rating them as poor.
Recommended:
No
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Epinions.com ID:
opynyun8ed
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Reviews written: 4
Trusted by: 0 members
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