Do Not Use Hertz Rental

• Lori Palminteri
• Uncategorized
• May 31, 2024

Renting a car has gotten astronomically expensive— I mean, EVERYTHING has gotten more expensive, I spend far too many minutes a day wondering how anyone even affords living in country and planning on marrying a foreigner for duel citizenship so I can leave this country when it inevitably sinks. But that’s a rant for another time.

Rental cars can easily double your cost of traveling, and as someone who’s been doing the road for basically a decade, the increase especially stings since comedians haven’t gotten a raise in a 20 years. I’ve used all different rental companies. I tend to avoid the “cheapest” ones because of past bad experiences. My goto rental companies, for years, has been Hertz and Enterprise.

Hertz, however, I will never use again, and I advise you to do the same.

Last year, I was in Florida opening for Colin Quinn on his tour, then I visited my parents, and then I had my own headlining gigs in Boca. I used Hertz rental for both. After touring with Colin, I returned the car and then picked up another car for my shows. It didn’t make sense to keep a car staying with my parents. My parents only have one car and also a golf cart* so they don’t have a vehicle to lend me.

*[Side story about golf carts. My parents, among many others in Florida, are obsessed with their golf carts. They ride them around town and to the community square, popping on side walks, blasting music and decorating them. My folks have “one of the best golf carts” in their community, and boy do they love to brag about it. They paid the price that you would pay for a shitty car. Sometimes I think they love that golf cart more than me.]

With Colin, we drove all over Florida. We started on the west coast, drove over four hours northeast to the other coast, and another couple hours south. Opening for Colin, as always, is a pleasure and a highlight of my career. Colin, a true Brooklynite, prefers not to drive. I like driving most of the time, so I enjoy driving him whilst we talk about comedy and all sorts of things life. It’s a lot of laughs.

All goes well with that rental car. Then, I get a rental car for my shows. Upon returning it, at Hertz, they pointed out there was a knick on the windshield, a small circle, about the size of a pencil eraser. It was near the windshield wiper, so I could not see it from inside the car. I acknowledge it’s existence, since I have eyes, but genuinely did not know it was there and it could have been there when I got it.

A few days go by, and Hertz calls me and tells me I’m liable for a whole new windshield that would cost $500. Um… what?! Okay, okay… so I may be a girl and a millennial, but I know more about cars than most. And it doesn’t cost $500 to fix that. It’s so small, they could literally put resin in it for like $40 (in fact, if I had seen it, I would have done this myself). Additionally, I own a car and have insurance, so when I have gotten cracks on my windshield in the past, it’s fully covered. Safelite shows up to my home and fixes it. $0 deductible.

So I tell them I’m not paying $500 (I’m extra pissed because that would be almost all the money I made at the Boca shows), nor am I ever using Hertz again and they can contact my insurance. My insurance had to deal with their bullshit, which is their job, and got them to agree to $100, which is better, but still hooey if you ask me.

As stated before, I will never use Hertz again. I’ve been a Gold Member for years and have given them lots of business. This is highway robbery and the next time you rent a car, I suggest you also shun Hertz so this doesn’t also happen to you.

This blog and getting people to boycott them is my revenge. It will cost them more than a petty windshield repair.