Alamo Review

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mrkstvns
Austin, TX

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Watch Out for the Pre-Pay GOTCHA!!

noticing the details, NOT going to pay a lot for a rental car

Cons

pre-paid rental reservations available, savings can be illusory

JUN

2008

There's already enough complications and corporates scams going on, lurking beneath glossy come-on ads, just waiting for the chance to snare an unsuspecting traveler. Car rental companies have more than their share of unethical business practices. Wildly overpriced unnecessary "insurance waivers" has to be the biggest scam in the industry, but the overpaid car rental execs are working overtime to come up with new ways to scam the clients.

One of the latest scams from Alamo is their "pre-pay" promos. Theoretically, you can "save 10% by pre-paying", but when you investigate just a little tiny bit, you see that you can usually save even MORE than 10% by switching from Alamo to a competitor WITHOUT the need to pre-pay. When I've compared Alamo rates to Enterprise, I find I usually win by booking a NON-PREPAID reservation through Enterprise.

Pre-paid travel services of any kind should be viewed with suspicion. Some of the problems include:

inflexible conditions, which are often buried in "fine print
slow refunds on cancellations
unexpected "holds" against your credit limit or checking account, if debit cards used
some pre-pay deals are unchangeable

Even if you do "save 10%" by using the Alamo pre-pay reservation, the savings are unlikely to really amount to a true 10% --- that's because in too many local jurisdictions, sleazy politicians have loaded down rental car services with add-on stadium construction fees, airport concession fees, sky-high local taxes, and anything else they feel they can stick on the non-voting traveler. So while you might get 10% off your base rate, the bottom line savings may be only 5% or less. If you simply MUST do a pre-pay, you can usually save even more than that by doing the pre-pay via Priceline or Hotwire --- the service will suck and everything will be totally unchangeable, but if you're the kind of person who shops price only, then it'll be a cheaper option.

Car rentals have customarily been non-prepaid services, which has really worked to the advantage of the traveling public. Miss a connecting flight these days or forget to cancel a hotel reservation and you're likely to lose a big chunk of money. Car rentals have been one of the few low-risk areas of travel, and there's no reason for you and I to help change that.

"Just say NO to pre-paid car rentals."

Alamo is not recommended by mrkstvns

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Comments about mrkstvns’s Review

steve9631 wrote on Jun 9, 2008 at 10:17PM

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Alamo sucks. Right on. Has for years. Good review.

GeorgeChabot wrote on Jun 8, 2008 at 2:28PM

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Car rental is almost as bad as air travel nowadays. ;>

mrkstvns wrote on Jun 8, 2008 at 2:02PM

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In response to JovialCougar's comment from Jun 8, 2008 at 1:43PM:

That sure sounds nice, doesn't it? Unfortunately, straightforward pricing and straight-shooting policies are foreign languages in corporate America.

JovialCougar wrote on Jun 8, 2008 at 1:43PM

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I'm waiting for a car rental company to simply offer cars to rent for a fixed price with no insurance gotchas, spin-the-wheel-rates, or hidden fees. They would probably rocket to the #1 choice in a few weeks.

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