A Bad Romance

My love affair with ZipCar is over.

The idea behind ZipCar is great.  I’m able to rent a car by the hour, after conveniently booking the car online or through the app on my phone.  It’s all great until someone decided to not play by the rules. Today, I booked a car for 2 hours. From 12:30PM until 2:30PM, if you’d like for me to be exact about the timing.

Well, at 2PM I finally called off the reservation. (I had to call because if I were to cancel it online, there would have been a chance that I would have been hit with the “same-day” cancellation fee of $6.50. It was bad enough that I was threatened with a $3.50 charge for asking to speak to a representative.)

In ZipCar’s defense, they did leave me a message at 12:23PM indicating that the car was going to be 15-20 minutes late.  Since, I knew that I had booked a little cushion time into my reservation (like the responsible ZipCar user that I am,) I was willing to wait the 15 minutes ESPECIALLY since I was already at the garage waiting for the car.  Also in their defense, the first time I called, they said that I could rent a car or take a taxi for up to $200 and that I’d be reimbursed at a later date.  This is what really gets my knickers into a thong-like bunch…

By the time this offer was made, it was already 45 minutes past the start time of my reservation. I’ve got an angry The Lame Foot ® and I can’t stand for extended periods of time, hence renting a car instead of riding the bus! After 45 minutes, I was late for whatever I had planned.  Not only that, I’m asked to pony-up up to $200 dollars of my money interest-free. The last time I rented a car, there was a $500 hold put on my credit card until I had returned the car. So, right now, my funds can be tied up for up to $700 because the car is late. To add insult to injury, I currently live in Harvard Square where there is extremely limited parking. Where in the hell am I supposed to park the rental car that’s rented by the day instead of the hour?!!?

According to the ZipCar rules and fines, the delinquent driver can be charged up to $150 for returning the car late with an additional charge of $20 if they fail to return the car without at least a quarter of a tank of fuel.  So, ZipCar has the potential to earn $170 from this mess, and I’m only comp’d my 2 hour rental which was $18.59. Now if my math serves me right, they have little financial incentive to make sure that I’m happy and driving at 12:30PM, which makes me unhappy.

I don’t think it’s unreasonable to expect a little more than 2 free driving hours and a couple of insincere sounding “we’re sorry-s.”  I was patient.  I waited because I know that things happen, but ZipCar really needs to evaluate their policies and how they should respond when presented with an inconvenienced and upset customer.

It was good while it lasted…but the thrill is gone baby, the thrill is gone.