rental car rigmarole, part 1

It took me about 5 hours to get from Ithaca to Madison. Normally it's a 3.5 hour drive, but I was taking non-interstate roads with significantly lower speed limits, and also I took a couple longish stops to close my eyes for a few minutes -- night driving is a strain.

There was also a Thing with the rental car.

I went to Enterprise to pick up my car and the lady at the front desk said, essentially, "Sorry, we don't have a car for you."

To which I said, "What? I reserved it over a month ago!"

"Yes, well, we had 48 car requests this morning and only 8 cars, so we've been running behind all day," she said. "But! We called Avis at the airport, and they have a Toyota Yaris set aside for you."

"And how am I supposed to get to the airport to pick it up?" I asked, since the entire point of renting a car is that you don't already have a car.

"We'll drive you in the Durango," she said. "Unless you want to take the Durango instead of an economy car?"

"Avis will be fine," I said. And so I got a ride out to the airport and went through the rental song and dance (which includes a discount for participating in a trial GPS program -- useless, since I'm not using the GPS unit, but arguing with a discount is silly) and picked up my temporary car. It's small and white and has absolutely no bells or whistles whatsover, which is fine since I only need it until Friday afternoon.

...

This is twice in a row I've had rental car problems. The first one, at Cat's wedding, was not anybody's fault, but this time I do wonder a bit about the person in charge of logistics at Enterprise. 40-car shortages should not happen!

rental car rigmarole, part 1

It took me about 5 hours to get from Ithaca to Madison. Normally it's a 3.5 hour drive, but I was taking non-interstate roads with significantly lower speed limits, and also I took a couple longish stops to close my eyes for a few minutes -- night driving is a strain.

There was also a Thing with the rental car.

I went to Enterprise to pick up my car and the lady at the front desk said, essentially, "Sorry, we don't have a car for you."

To which I said, "What? I reserved it over a month ago!"

"Yes, well, we had 48 car requests this morning and only 8 cars, so we've been running behind all day," she said. "But! We called Avis at the airport, and they have a Toyota Yaris set aside for you."

"And how am I supposed to get to the airport to pick it up?" I asked, since the entire point of renting a car is that you don't already have a car.

"We'll drive you in the Durango," she said. "Unless you want to take the Durango instead of an economy car?"

"Avis will be fine," I said. And so I got a ride out to the airport and went through the rental song and dance (which includes a discount for participating in a trial GPS program -- useless, since I'm not using the GPS unit, but arguing with a discount is silly) and picked up my temporary car. It's small and white and has absolutely no bells or whistles whatsover, which is fine since I only need it until Friday afternoon.

...

This is twice in a row I've had rental car problems. The first one, at Cat's wedding, was not anybody's fault, but this time I do wonder a bit about the person in charge of logistics at Enterprise. 40-car shortages should not happen!