Thrifty Rent A Car
reviews and complaints

Dollar/Thrifty hires incompetent staff and abuses its customers. Do business with anyone else you can.

A cousin from a different state rented a Thrifty car and entered my telephone number for her "contact person", without my knowledge or permission. The cousin was stopped by the Ga. State police and institutionalized, and the car was impounded. Thrifty called me, and I informed them of the little facts that I knew solely because I had been called by the Ga. State police. Thrifty then entered my telephone number into their automatic dialing system, and called my home every day for the next 2 weeks. When I returned their call and asked to have my number removed from their system, their employee who identified herself as Crea refused.

i rented a car at thrifty through southwest airlines for feb 26 2009 to use when i flew from florida to warwick ri. to bury my 36 year old daughter in law. when i called from baltimore, no car had ben reserved, when i got to warwick ri they charged me 318.80, but on my credit card they put 355.00 RA#OPO179O71. I CALLED WARWICK RI, SUNDAY AND THEY TOLD ME I WAS CORRECTED AND TO TYPE THIS. THEY ARE LOCATED ON POST ROAD IN WARWICK RI. I WOULD LIKE THE CREDIT CARD CORRECTED. UI RETURNED THE CAR ON MARCH 5 2009, THANK YOU DEBI KOSARICK

I also got charged 60.00 in administrative fees for a 3.54 toll. Ridiculous. Was never explained to me how it worked. The lady told me too bad. If I had called the toll place within (48 hours) of going through the toll and paid it then I would not have administrative charges. I said where was the phone number because I have no bill and she said they are on the side of the road. Excuse me ma'am let me text it while driving or stop in the middle of the road SMDH I will never rent from this crooked company.

Recently, my wife and I pre-arranged on
line to rent an automobile from Thrifty Car Rental to use on our vacation trip
to Germany. When we arrived at the Frankfurt Airport and presented our
pre-rental agreement to Ms. Nicki, the representative of Thrifty Car Rental at
that airport, she refused to abide by the wording of the pre-rental agreement.
She said that, if we wanted to rent the car, we would be obligated to buy Loss
Damage Waiver (LDW) and Theft Protection (TP) insurance coverages, both of
which our pre-rental agreement with Thrifty had declared were “optional at the
counter” coverages, depending on whether or not we already had these coverages
through our Gold “World” Master Card (which we did). The Thrifty LDW and TP
coverages would increase our rental cost for the car we had reserved from the
pre-rental quote of 402.29 euro (appx. $583.00) to over 1, 000.00 euro (more
than $1, 450, 00). No amount of logic or persuasion could budge Ms. Nicki from
her position.

Therefore, reader, please be warned: when
it comes to international car rentals in Europe, Thrifty Car Rental is
currently playing a heinous, wholly unacceptable game of “Bait and Switch, ”
attempting to extort almost three times their rental fee once they have hooked
you into a reservation with them. We refused to rent Thrifty’s car and found
another car with another company, but, you need not put yourself through that
added stress and expense. Do not seek to rent from Thrifty Car Rental in the
first place: this company is not to be trusted.

This is the second time in two months I have attempted to rent at Thrifty at Midway Airport in Chicago and they are incompetent, rude and disrespectful. They could care less about you or your needs. I reserved a full sized SUV over a month in advance and when I showed up they tried to put me in a small Ford Escape. I had 6 people and lots of luggage and needed a truck. I walked over to Avis and was treated like a king. they found a Suburban, cleaned it up in 15 minutes, went to check on it, and the manager was there when I got into it to make sure I was taken care of. there really is no reason to give Thrifty any of your business. The workers act like Chicago mafia or Union workers who can't be removed. Fire them all and start over!

Thrifty adds $15 per toll in Dallas as an "admin fee". Total price gouging.

I had the same experience at ANC. Told them I decline all additional coverage and showed them a copy of my current AAA insurance. Surprised to fine they charged me LDW and something called RS/TS. More than doubled my daily rate. Really angry and will find out what I can do.

I rented a vehicle from Ontario Thrifty on July 3rd for the holiday weekend. On Tuesday went to return the vehicle and the car was running very poorly so I pulled off the freeway and called thrifty roadside help which they told me they would send a tow truck which was fine. Minutes later I got a call back from thrifty stating it would be a 45 minute wait which I told the rep I could not wait 45 minutes as I was already late to my appointment at work. Once the tow truck driver got to the location he called me which I told him where he could find the keys. Weeks later after coming home from vacation I see a demand letter for the vehicle which I couldn’t understand so I check my bank account and I see charges over $1000.00 so I call them to find out what is going on. I couldn’t believe not one person seems to anything! I asked to speak with a supervisor and was told they would call me back which never happened! Spoke with another rep which told me “the 2nd car was never returned” which I asked her what 2nd car was she talking about I never rented a 2nd car from you guys! I asked her if she could email me or fax me the info which she stated she could not do. I told her in no way had I ever rented a 2nd vehicle! After doing my own research come to find out the thrifty tow truck driver dropped off a 2nd vehicle when he picked up the 1st one which has to be dumbest thing I ever heard! Who in their right mind would drop off a car to someone that was not even there and not even notify them! Since when whould a company drop off a vehicle on a street and not even notify anyone? I went and got a printout at the Ontario location and it is very clear your they just dropped off a car in the middle of nowhere and expect me to pay for it! The car was parked in the same location where they just dropped it off at got tickets everyday until the county had it towed away and charged me total of over $2300 in fees? I compared on my rental slip a different VEH#0614740, License plate #hrx854 and color WHITE is the car I rented and signed for however on the printout the lady gave me it states VEH#0690255, License 5zmf160 and color SILVER I would love for this company to produce ONE document stating I ever agreed or signed for this vehicle at question! I have yet to receive one phone call back from Tran ext 770 or any other supervisor nor did Steve Shelley at Thrifty Car Rental 3450 Airport Drive Suite 500 Ontario, CA 91764 reply to my better business complaint this is in noway acceptable! I have yet to hear from this company I'm just going to have to sue them SMH

I was also charged for additional insurance that I verbally declined. I rented a suv at Denver Int. Airport on 6/23/12 and when the agent asked if I wanted the additional coverage I said no and that my personal insurance covered it. He had me agree and not agree to things on the screen which I assumed reflected my verbal acknowledgments and I trusted they were correct, WRONG! On the day before I was to turn the rental in I pulled out the bill to check to see how many miles I had driven on my trip and realized it was much higher than it should have been. After careful examination I saw where they charged me $26.99 a day for 9 days for the insurance for a total of almost $243.00. I immediatelly got on my cell phone and tryed to contact them and was on hold til my phone died. I figured I'd wait til I returned it the next day to plead my case. After telling the clerk the story he brought up the screen where he said I had accepted and told me he couldn't do anything about it because I went the whole 9 days covered and they would have had to cover me if something had happened. I was incensed that it had happened and that I trusted them enough not to double check the bill earlier but it was late and I was in a hurry to get to my hotel. After reading all these other posts I really feel like a sucker! I will contact them soon about this and hopefully they will either credit it or give me a credit toward my next rental. If not, there will never be a next time for them or their sisster company Dollar rent a car.

We had a very bad experience with Thrifty Car Rental and we are not going to do business with your company again. We're on our first east coast trip coming from LA for a whole week as a family. I was with my wife and our 2 sons who are toddlers, my mom and dad and my brother. Our itinerary was to drive from Washington DC to PA then to NY. We rented a Dodge Grand Caravan at 6:30am Thursday on 4/26/2012 at Dulles Airport Thrifty (DTG Operations DBA Thrifty Car Rental) coming from an evening flight from LAX to IAD, the rental process was a smooth transaction. As we go along our way we were stopped by a Virginia state police advising us that the license plate of our rental does not match the vehicle. The license plate of the rental is a North Carolina and that the plate matches a Chevy Malibu and not a Dodge Grand Caravan. We showed the officer proof that it was a rental and to show that the vehicle isn’t stolen. The officer then advised me to call thrifty rental back in Dulles, (which I had a hard time contacting since their number is not listed on the receipt) only number listed was an 800 number. I called the 800 number and a female thrifty customer service rep gladly assisted me and suggests that I drive back to Dulles (which is 30 miles away and totally out of our way) to exchange the rental, she mentioned that she already spoke with the manager David Gill. So we drove back and David Gill came out, checked out the 1st rental and asked me to pick another van, so I did. He didn't even apologize for all the trouble. After that, David Gill went inside the office. As we were moving our luggage from one van to the other 5 min later, the rental agent (who assisted us when we got the 1st rental) brought me a new receipt and stated that there's a discount that David Gill adjusted, which I thought we deserve in the first place because of this incident. On the new receipt, David Gill "handwrote" the drop-off adjustment of minus $150.00 which really didn't make any sense (handwritten?). I thought to myself maybe it'll be adjusted when I return the rental in NY JFK airport Thrifty. My mistake was I didn’t go back in to question David Gill why the adjustment is handwritten. That’s because we’re out of our schedule due to this misfortune.
On the day of the rental car return, I showed the new receipt David Gill gave me with the adjustment and mentioned to the JFK thrifty rental agent of the incident that transpired. The rental agent checked out the transaction in your system and noticed that no adjustment has been made by David Gill. The agent then called a manager via phone (no manager on duty?) and told her of my story, the manager asked the agent to check on the system notes. David Gill noted of the issue with the license plate and rental exchange but the way the agent read it states, "Add drop of charge $150", which confuses her because on my receipt there's a handwritten adjustment of minus $150 and initialed by David Gill. I told her its common sense, you see the notes about the issue on the license plate and I’m sure David Gill meant to put "deduct $150". She said they can't adjust the price, that David Gill should've done this in the first place. She insisted and continued talking to her manager on the phone, the manager then told the agent to tell me to call the 800 number to reach David Gill. I responded, "Why do I need to call him directly? Why don't you call and ask? As a consumer I don't get involve with interoffice communications. I explained that I never spoke to David Gill on the phone, it was a customer service rep who's communicating with him directly when I called the 800 number". The manager and agent insisted that I call the 800 and so I did using your own company phone (ridiculous). I ended up talking to a man from customer service that’s not very helpful at all either (who I thought should be fired), I advised him of the situation and told me to talk to the manager. I told him that it was the manager that told me to call customer service regarding this and now he's telling me that the manager needs to decide?! Now this is really getting out of hand! I told the male customer service rep to speak with the rental agent about what's going on and their conversation ended right away. Now I decided to talk to the manager over the phone, I told her how dissatisfied I am, that I'm with my wife and 2 toddlers waiting outside when it's raining and cold and that we have a flight back to LA and this whole thing is holding us back. The manager then decided to communicate with David Gill directly (which I thought that's what she needed to do in the first place?!) and we had to wait another 20 minutes for them to close out the transaction. It took at least an hour of explaining, frustration and run around. The way your system works is unacceptable. Your company might charge low compared to other rental car companies but this ordeal that a consumer goes through is unacceptable. I wouldn't be surprised if this happen often.

Thrifty clearly must train its employees to steal from consumers by fraudelentling adding on charges, in particular this LDW expense.
we clearly said know all 3 times we were asked about paying for it at rental. Finally you are so exhausted by the sales pitch that you quickly click all the boxes on the hard to read 5 inch screen, only to find out 3 days later that you paid 14.99 a day for LDW that you clearly refused. The clerk knows it while you are walking away and worse, when you return there is absolutely no way to get a refund or to explain to the manager the mistake. This is because the manager gets paid more (usually is franchise owner) an expects/trains his employees to first sell, then sneak the charges in despite the verbal refusal. I will never use Thrifty again, will walk, cab, bus or ride a mule first. Even the mule would treat me with more respect than Thrifty did.

Did you call Thrifty Customer Service? Did you go to their online site to see what terms and conditions were and what ID is required?

Confirm with them if this is policy. If not, report the person who copied your license and also tell Thrifty that you will file a police report with the local police in the jurisdiction of that rental place. Filing a police report gives you some protection in case your ID was stolen and you are asked to cover any fraudulent charges in a court of law.

I was not paid my full refund I would like someone to call me at 404/606/0840

I rented a car in October this year paid for rental, when picking my rental up at location my credit card that I paid with was lost, so for me to get rental I had to call and get refund and then use new card and I did not get back what I paid

I don't trust computer confirmations. Last time I flew to Palm Springs I had computer confirmation, but no ride showed up and no phone number to contact. Needed to arrange for UBER at great extra cost!

I NEED to talk to customer service person BEFORE I arrive this time!

Date of arrival is 9/17/23, confirmation K5430862307

JULY 2 - JULY 11

The attached receipts will illustrate how "Thrifty" received my full payment via Priceline, then Thrifty/Hertz confirmed my reservation and proceeded to charge me (again) - paid in full (see attached).

Please review the attachments and prepare my refund.

Daniel Higgons, Special Agent

I made a reservation for July 14, 2023 through a 3rd party (expedia) When I tried to pay, I was road there would be a $200 deposit on my credit card. I did not have enough credit to use that card. I tried to use my debit card with a $500 deposit. I was denied a rental due to my credit score so I did not rent a car from Thrifty

The wait line is longer than airport security here in Atlanta with only two representatives manning the desk. Pure pandemonium with disgruntled passengers who are waiting for their cars!

On a Holiday weekend, one would expect and assume that the service personnel would be available for a busy Friday evening! Unbelievable!

i got charged 400 dollars for a smoking fee. I did not smoke in the vehicle. What can be done in this case? There was sand in the vehicle being we were at the ocean the whole week and had an 8 year old with as well.

Boston to Atlanta Airport. Flight number 1097.

Date, November 9th, 2022.

I have been at thrifty rental in Atlanta GA. I I have been waiting for 2 hours + to get my rental! This is a joke. I needed to be at a reception and I’m still in Atlanta Airport. Thanks a lot for doing nothing! 🤬

My car till was $3.80. Please remove the $15.00 administration fee immediately.

Atlanta - International Airport - Monday September 12, 2022. 1:20 pm. 50 people in line for rentals. 2 people working the desks. What a joke. When I finally got through the line after 1.5 hours there was still 50 people in line. No urgency by the staff and no additional help called in. Not good optics.

i rented a car in phl on 7/21, the rudest counter personal and the worst customer service, also when returned after 4 weeks on 8/17 they charged me $200. for cleaning the car from sea sand when we found food and a pizza box under the seat from person before, also wife is not free to drive when "all" other rentals that i rented wife is free.