Hertz has been on a rollercoaster ride over the last 2 years. In May 2020, the company filed for bankruptcy due to the pandemic and travel shutdown. A combination of factors turned things around and less than a year later the company exited bankruptcy with less debt, new funding and a new line of credit.
However, Hertz has one major problem to deal with. It’s suffering through a slowly progressing public relations disaster that will leave a mark on the brand for years to come. Even worse for the company is that they’re not doing much to solve the problem.
Perception is reality. Even if a rumor isn’t true, if it’s allowed to persist long enough then people will believe it. When there’s proof of the problem, it makes things worse.
I’m referring to multiple stories about Hertz customers being arrested and placed in jail because Hertz reported them for not returning a rental car when they did return the car. There’s also the story about Hertz repossessing a car in the middle of a rental.
It’s gotten to the point that whenever we mention Hertz, there’s going to be some comment referring to the problem like “Renting from Hertz? Hope you don’t get arrested.” It’s sunk into the collective psyche to the point where I’ve changed my actions because of it.
Because I had gotten a really sweet deal that was $100 less that Autoslash’s price, our most recent two rentals, when we were in Hawaii, were from Hertz. When I returned the first car (we were about to island hop from Kauai to Oahu), I made sure to have the agent check the car in, instead of just leaving it with the keys. We took a picture of the car in the lot with a timestamp. Even though I did all of this, I still was nervous when I didn’t receive an email receipt.
I took to Twitter and wanted to confirm the car was marked as returned.
Several hours later I did receive the email receipt. Sure, it’s possible they would have sent it without my Twitter request. But other car rental companies manage to send electronic receipts immediately, not hours later. Besides that, it’s pretty telling that I felt the need to message Hertz in the first place, because I wanted to make sure the car was marked as returned and the cops weren’t going to come knocking with an arrest warrant. That kind of reputation isn’t a good look for any company.
Hertz needs to prevent more stories about false arrests. If I were them, before overhauling how they keep track of their cars, I’d check multiple times in multiple places before filing stolen car reports. Every additional story will make it harder for them to shake off the bad PR.
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