Survey: Car rental companies should only pursue claims when damage is acknowledged by driver


We’ve had quite the discussion about car rental damages this week, but now it’s your turn to sound off.

A weekend poll asked when you think it’s appropriate for a car rental agency to come after you with a damage claim, and a majority of you (about 75 percent) said the only time it’s OK is when you acknowledge the damage and sign a claim form.

Less than a quarter (22 percent) said damage claims should go out if the previous rental car was recorded as being returned undamaged, but it is now.

A fraction of respondents — about 8 percent — said claims should go out if the car has damage, and you were the last person to rent it.

Your comments on the subject were just as interesting.

Many of you said the key to solving the problem of unwarranted claims was a pre-rental inspection. Barb Nahoumi suggests,

Before signing for the car, the agent should do a walk-around with the renter. Any previous dings should be recorded, thus the new renter would not be held responsible for them.

If a claim is made, the car rental company needs evidence — irrefutable evidence — that the damage was caused by the renter, says reader Tim Carpenter.

There [should be] undeniable proof that the damage was done during the rental. ie, crash damage that can easily be seen, such as broken head/tailights, body damage to an extent that it can’t be denied. They should not be pursuing claims for minor dings/dents/scrathes/glass chips.

What kind of proof does a car rental company need? Josh Mastronarde has an idea.

If the rental company has photographs showing the damage was not there when the car was delivered to the renter. I personally don’t have a problem with renters paying for actual proven damage during their rental (though I have issues with $800 repairs for minor dents that most of us would ignore on our own cars), but I don’t think the rental company just having random written notes from a previous checkin is sufficient (different agents may miss different things, etc).

Yes, renters need to protect themselves by noting damage at checkout, taking pictures, etc, but that doesn’t mean the rental company isn’t also responsible for giving real credible evidence of the damage from their perspective.

Bottom line: The claims process is badly dented and lacks credibility. That’s the assessment of Bunnee Butterfield.

I think car rental companies need a better process at both ends – giving the renter a status at the start of the rental which has to be confirmed by the renter after seeing the car and checking it and giving the renter a status at the end of the rental – same thing.

I know rental companies are slammed sometimes when people are turning in cars and have no time to do a thorough check, so I suspect neither of these processes will ever be instituted.

Kathleen Eaton seconds that suggestion, asking,

Why isn’t there a uniform process in place at all rental companies to have cars inspected by both parties at the time of receipt and an acknowledgement signed on the condition of the vehicle with digital photos of any damages? Why isn’t the same process employed when a car is returned? Wouldn’t that be a simple way to avoid endless claims and disputes?

I have a feeling this won’t be the last time I’ll write about car rental claims. In the meantime, my advice to car renters is to remain vigilant. Take pictures and video of your car, both before and after the rental, and wherever possible, get someone to sign off on the car after you’ve returned it.

  • Bill

    I seem to remember that long ago, they used to walk around the car with you and check things out, both upon rental and upon return.
    They don’t seem to do that anymore. I wonder if they see more issues now than they did years ago, when they did check.

    The problem is two fold here. One is that car rental companies are renting out cars even when they do have damage on them. You’d think if they were charging for the damage, they’d get it fixed. Renters need to be aware that they are liable for “any” damage that happens while they have the car. If someone drags a key down the side of the car when you are renting it, you’re responsible. If someone bashes your car in the parking lot, you’re responsible. If the valet parking dents the car, it is up to you to deal with it.

    I see all of these complaints come up and it is next to impossible to figure out which ones are legit and which ones are not.

    They should do a full image of the car when it leaves the lot and when it comes back. I take lots of pictures.

  • Walt Blackadar

    Bill, that’s often difficult or impossible in some locations. I often get to the rental place at night and uniformly they’re poorly lit. You can’t even get a picture from your cell phone to show any damage. In some climates, the car is covered in snow during the winter, making it impossible to see the condition of the vehicle. At 10:00 PM you’re not going to go back inside the Terminal to try to find someone to clean off your car.

    Simply put, it’s up to the rental agency to show proof of damage. That means they need to take pictures before you rent the car and then promptly when you return it. If they can’t do so, then there’s no proof that the damage was caused by that particular customer. End of story.

  • John

    @Walt … You sign a statement as part of the rental contract that the vehicle was undamaged or that you have noted damage (Look for it the next time you rent). At that point, any damage that isn’t noted on the contract is your responsibility since you admitted in writing that it wasn’t present when you rented.

  • Steve

    @John: while that may be what the contract says, it’s unreasonable to put the responsibility of a vehicle inspection on the renter especially when the rental facility may put significant barriers in place to prevent that (dirty cars, poor lighting, employees who refuse to inspect the car themselves).

    The bottom line is this: if rental car companies will not implement their own systems to prove that a car was rented without damage (and I’m talking photos/videos – a signature from a minimum-wage employee is not enough), then they deserve to have these claims fought and fought hard.

  • jamru

    I agree with the commenters above that the rental companies need to do a better job of documenting and tracking new/exisiting damage on vehicles. It is often impractical and, I believe, unreasonable for car rental companies to put the onus on customers to do all the legwork to protect themselves from bogus claims. This certainly isn’t the norm in other areas of the travel industry (hotel rooms for example). Also, many of the perks of frequent renter programs are designed so that the renter has less, rather than more, interaction with employees, so the joint walk-around to note damage seems unlikely to be implemented on a wide scale. Or is the idea of my Hertz Gold membership allowing me to skip the check in line to give me more time to photograph my vehicle before driving off the lot?

  • Steve Smith

    If you do have to acknowledge the car is in good condition, draw a big X through the vehicle diagram and then initial it. If they want to complain, tell them to go inspect the vehicle in a well-lit area with you. They’ll decline every time and you’ll drive way not liable for anything.

  • Jesse

    I rent cars for work quite often, the Collision Damage Waiver (CDW) is included on the contract so I did not worry about whether the car was dinged or crashed!

    If renting for personal use, I always use my AMEX which includes CDW as well. If Amex did not include it (and when I have rented for personal use) I always choose to pay the extra 10 a day in order to avoid this…just for peace of mind!

    In a note about the survey, I believe those responses show those outcomes because the two alternatives to having the renter pick up the cost of repair basically give chance to not being the renters fault; however if the rental agency could prove (beyond doubt) that the renter damaged the vehicle, that would be different.

  • noah

    I wish I could say I was surprised by the result of this poll, but I am not. I voted for the middle ground — only if they can document that they gave it to you damage-free.

    If the overwhelming (75%) majority had their way, you could take your rental car to a private location and beat the heck out of it with a baseball bat. As long as you don’t “acknowledge damage and sign a claim form,” you’re off the hook, according to this majority. The attitude of, “I can do what ever I want to a rental car with no repercussions” is exactly why the rental car companies often have such harsh policies. Thank you, 75%, for ruining it for the 25% of us who are reasonable.

  • Drew

    Heh… I like the idea of drawing a big “X” through the damage record… I did something like that recently when renting from Enterprise in Columbia, MO… I was asked to sign the paperwork without seeing the car… I asked to go out and see the car before I signed it and was told that I had to sign the paperwork before I left the counter. I promptly circled the area for damage, put “signed under protest, have not seen vehicle” and signed that section. The clerk proceeded to yell at me for doing that, drawing the attention of the Airport Police. I told her that she had two options–either let me go out and look at the car before I signed a new copy, or let it go the way it was. She let it go the way it was…

    Thankfully, there was no damage to the car… but this is also the same Enterprise that tried to ding me for a fuel charge–when the mileage they noted was _75 miles more_ than it had been when I returned the car (I had a timestamped photo of the car’s odometer, with the airport door clearly visible in the photo.)..

  • Steve

    @noah: I think it’s unfair to state that 75% of respondents feel that they should be able to damage a rental car and not pay for it. For one thing, I didn’t feel that the poll was set up very well and I didn’t agree with *any* of the three answers, though the first one came closest to my feelings.

    And you might want to reread option #2. I agree with your opinion that the rental car company should ding you only if they gave you the car without any damage, but that’s not quite what the poll question reads. What it says is “if the previous rental car was recorded as being returned undamaged.” There are two big holes in that answer: what happens if an employee or someone else damages in the car in the lot after it’s been checked in from the last rental but before you pick it up, and what happens if a careless employee fails to note damage that occurred on the last rental (and thus records the car as undamaged when it’s *not*).

    As such, I feel that the rental car company needs to provide proof that the car was undamaged when it was given to the most recent renter – and I mean photographic proof.

    I like Steve Smith’s suggestion above – and really, if you include all of the miniscule dings and scratches that any reasonable person would consider wear and tear but a rental company considers damage (at least, if they happen to feel like pursuing it), it’s not inaccurate to just claim that the whole car is damaged.

  • Joe Farrell

    So a person should not responsible for damage unless they agree to pay for it? Does that imply I can wrap a car around a tree while driving intoxicated and refuse to acknowledge it and thusly escape liability?

    The correct answer – and the one which I checked – was if the car rental company can prove that YOU caused the damage. Merely because a car was signed in last without damage is not proof, given how these things operate in the real word, that you caused the damage. They need to have photographs of the vehicle before and after. When you bring a car back, it is always subject to ‘normal wear and tear.’ This normal wear and tear includes things like chips and dings in paint and the doors – any ‘damage’ that the average vehicle owner would generally not repair on their own is normal wear and tear. So, if you get a door ding, the average owner is not going to take the door off and have it repainted for what happens day in and day out in the real world. .. .

    And what happened to that option Chris, I thought it was a 4 question poll when I took it.

  • Josh

    @Noah, @Joe — that 4th option wasn’t there when I, and many others answered (I’d like to think it was added later because I emailed Chris, but maybe not :-)

    Most of us who answered “only if acknowledged” didn’t mean that people can beat up the car and lie about it on return; we just didn’t believe that the rental company “documents” of the lack of prior damage (a hastily scribbled checkin form) are sufficient.

    If the rental company has clear evidence of real damage (and I agree with Joe and others that nicks and dings aren’t “damage”) that was caused by that renter, then of course they should be able to collect. Before/after photographs are as “clear” as you’re going to get…

  • Christopher Elliott

    There were only three answers on that poll.

  • Plat flyer

    Your poll was flawed, the questions were ambiguous

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