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A.I. Is Making Sure You Pay for That Ding on Your Rental Car

(www.nytimes.com)
42 points pseudolus | 1 comments | 13 Jul 25 01:25 UTC | HN request time: 0.211s | source
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kevingadd ◴[13 Jul 25 01:44 UTC] No.44546796[source]▶
The Hertz from this article is a company you should never do business with, unless you like getting falsely accused of a felony, arrested, and imprisoned for no reason:

https://www.npr.org/2022/12/06/1140998674/hertz-false-accusa...

I personally use other companies when I rent a car... but I'm also paranoid about the kind of nonsense described in the article, so I just buy the damage coverage when I rent the car. It means renting a car is far more expensive than it should be, but it saved my bacon the last time I rented when someone dinged the paint.

It's funny that the AI bogeyman is used in the article to make this new tech seem scarier. The problem is the general practice of trying to milk you for money over regular wear and tear.

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1. vrosas ◴[13 Jul 25 01:51 UTC] No.44546832[source]▶
I'm an Avis person myself, and their response at the bottom of the article gives me a little hope that they've at least thought about this tech for more than 8 seconds. I once drove into the rental center with part of the car dragging along the ground, as it had been for the past 100ish miles. The conversation was as follows:

Avis employee: "Sounds like you got part of the car dragging."

Me: "Yeah I noticed that."

Avis employee: "Don't worry about it, here's your receipt."