solaarphunk a day ago

I'm always unbelievably pissed off when I reserve a premium tier of car at SFO for a business trip, and Hertz tries to stick me with a Tesla, as if it is a premium car (horrible interior build quality), and with the assumption I have time to install apps and figure out how to use car charging infrastructure.

  • jvanderbot a day ago

    The Tesla is not the kind of car I'd like to just jump into for a two day trip, but the neither the car charger or key card entry requires an app, or is particularly weird. You touch the key card to the door column to open or lock, and you plug the charger in.

    But the interior build and the touchpad interface mean it'll never be a top choice. It's just awful.

    • 7e 3 hours ago

      No CarPlay is a deal-breaker, as are the hours long queues to supercharge in California.

  • nunez 5 hours ago

    Conversely, I get frustrated when I ask for a long range electric car and they either only have ICE cars or they have, like, a Bolt (an EV that I love, but long range it is not).

  • ghaff a day ago

    Maybe I want the novelty of trying out an electric car on a business trip. But far more likely I just want a bog ordinary car that I can drive from point A to point B.

    • MBCook 21 hours ago

      It’s reasonable to have a few for that. Hertz has their premium stuff where you can rent all sorts of interesting cars.

      I think they were just too early in trying to put a lot of them in the standard rotation.

      • ghaff 21 hours ago

        Maybe. The problem with a mass market rental outfit is that you end up passing out vehicles on a take it or leave it basis.

        But I agree with the basic idea that specialty vehicles need to be in a separate category.

        • MBCook 20 hours ago

          My theory is it will work itself out in time. Once let’s say a quarter or maybe half the population is driving EVs, they’re not specialty vehicles anymore. There will be plenty of people willing to accept them so if you run into someone who absolutely doesn’t want one you’ll probably be able to compensate just fine. It will cease to be a specialty car.

          It will be a little more like manual versus automatic used to be. Anyone can drive an automatic, but some people can only drive an automatic.

          But if you don’t give EVs to people charged and there aren’t enough chargers around then even people who would otherwise take them (owners + the curious) will avoid them.

          • ghaff 19 hours ago

            Sure. At some point EVs become something that someone renting a car would be expected to know how to deal with. Of course, that could take a while though. And it may be unevenly distributed. The uptake of automatics has been much slower outside of the US and, within the US, I've actually had a service associate need to have a tech drive out my car because they couldn't drive a stick.

      • nunez 5 hours ago

        Only at hub airports

  • nradov 21 hours ago

    Some Hertz locations will also try to stick you with a Polestar 2 EV, which are as bad or worse. I've now switched to Enterprise for most rentals.

  • sshine 11 hours ago

    I think Teslas have amazing interior.

    You’re not stuck with Tesla chargers. But they’re kind of neat because you only need to authenticate once, and not on every charge.

    The rest of the criticism, I believe, applies to EVs in general.

    • piva00 9 hours ago

      At the same price point Teslas have a very spartan and cheap feeling interiors compared to almost any European manufacturer.

      Sitting on a Mercedes CLA is much more comfortable than any Tesla around US$ 45k. It becomes even more disparaging when you go higher on price, a Tesla Model S at US$ 73k interior looks dreadful compared to any Volvo/Audi/Mercedes/BMW at the same price.

      It's not even a nice looking minimalism, it's just spartan and cheap looking/feeling.

      • nunez 5 hours ago

        Super ultra hard disagree.

        Base/rental trim -A and -B Benz interiors are terrible (in the US). Hard seats, plastic everywhere, shit tier center LCDs; list goes on. Civics are better.

        I agree that the Model S interior falls short of most cars in its price range, though.

        • piva00 4 hours ago

          I'm comparing from living in Europe, have no idea how these cars are in the USA.

          I ride in Teslas cabs quite often here in Stockholm and they are comfortable but not at all what I'd expect from a high-end interior, the Mercedes, Lexus, Volvo, and similar cabs here look much better inside than any of the Teslas I got so far (Model S/Model Y).

          • nunez an hour ago

            Ah; fair play then.

            The A and B trims in the US are the lowest tiers that Mercedes-Benz offers and are spartan, but tacky.

            Tesla’s high-end cars don’t have high-end cabins; we agree there.

            In the recent past, a Model S with FSD was $143k for the Plaid trim. This was comparable in price to a Benz S550 or a BMW 750i, both of which have incredible, incredible interiors. Super plush, real leather seats; rare wood grain everywhere; customization to no end; coffin-quiet cabins; plush air suspension; etc.

            That’s before taking the dealer experience into account. I don’t have experience with Benz dealers, but my understanding of them is that they are actually worth spending time in, and they take care of you when things go wrong (loaners of equivalent trim or just below; great coffee; clean centers; etc.)

            Meanwhile, both Teslas offer cabins that I’d say are beneath what you’d get from a maxed-out Honda Accord. I have two Model 3s (old and new designs) and have rented the S a few times now, and I love Teslas, for what that’s worth.

            Mobile service kicks ass, but if you need to bring the thing in for service, you’re probably looking at Uber credits. Shameful for the price.

            Technology was the only thing the Tesla had the upper hand in.

ianferrel a day ago

>Tesla has an 8-year, 100,000 mile warranty on its battery packs, and there’s still a good bit of that battery warranty remaining on this particular car, assuming Tesla will honor it on a used rental car.

This feels like a load-bearing assumption that makes or breaks the thesis of the article that deserves more than being an assumption.

The model 3 warranty on Tesla's website does say that it covers ownership transfer, but who knows what language is in the Hertz purchase agreement.

  • sbuttgereit a day ago

    Well... the article goes on to say pretty much at the end...

    "For what it’s worth, there are a ton of used Teslas on the Hertz Car Sales site, but anything priced this cheaply shows well over six digits on the odometer, and isn’t nearly as appealing. It’s unclear if this Redditor just got a particularly good deal, or if Hertz is just trying to sell everything not nailed down before the end of the calendar year."

    I mean, if this is what the article is predicated on... seems weakly reported, lets just say.

    • jsjohnst a day ago

      It’s Jalopnik, it’s basically guaranteed to be poorly sourced and usually not supported with more evidence than a single tweet or Reddit post. Half the article is a ramble about the author never actually trying a Tesla.

    • antisthenes 19 hours ago

      There are only 9 Teslas on the Hertz Car Sales website as of today.

      Compared to over 7,000 Toyotas.

      And the Teslas aren't particularly aggressively priced. Which makes me question the validity of this entire article.

jsjohnst a day ago

The Hertz situation is in my opinion more their own fault vs Tesla. I’ve rented Teslas from them every time they were available when traveling in like 10-12 cities and all of them were poorly handled by local staff imho. As a Tesla owner from back when there was long wait lists (aka before the price cuts), I do sympathize with the insane depreciation aspect though.

  • MBCook 21 hours ago

    First, I think they were just too far ahead of the market. I don’t think there are enough EV owners out there for this to work well.

    I wouldn’t mind renting an EV, I’ve done it. But that’s because I’m an owner. I wouldn’t expect any random ICE owner to be ready to just accept one.

    But from talking to my local Hertz (I asked him about this when I had to rent from them last year) basically no one in my area wants them. I assume very few of their customers are existing owners.

    On top of that I know that they’ve had big problems because even though they’re saving a ton of normal maintenance the cost of scratch and dent/fender bender stuff is way higher than expected since only Tesla sells Tesla parts. Makes me think going with another brand would’ve been smarter on this specific point.

    There’s of course anti anti-EV sentiment out there combined with anti-Musk stuff now. There’s no way that’s helping.

    I think renting EVs is a good idea. I understand they chose Tesla both because they have the volume and the charging network. But I think that bit them on repairs and sentiment.

    Mostly I think they were just a couple years too early. I think they thought the market would move faster than it has. I thought it would.

    Once more drivers are used to EVs a lot of the problems go away. Then all your left with is charging and repair costs, both fully solvable.

    • jsjohnst 20 hours ago

      > First, I think they were just too far ahead of the market. I don’t think there are enough EV owners out there for this to work well.

      This is exactly the problem. They do zero education of substance to help a non-EV driver get used to the experience. If I wasn’t already an experienced EV driver (or intentionally using the rental as an extended test drive), I’d be super pissed personally as they really leave you hanging.

      • moepstar 13 hours ago

        Two points on that:

        - Tesla themselves do this. If you book a test drive, you'll get emails where they tell you to watch a list of Youtube videos on how to handle the car. Nothing more will be done once you show up to do it - you'll do a little paperwork, you'll be guided onto the lot and maybe shown how to shift into D.

        Same procedure when you buy one (source: i did) - paperwork, here's your keycards, follow me onto the lot, mount license plate, bye!

        I mean - i get it, i neither want nor need a flower bouquet, a ceremony and some champagne when getting handed the keys to my new car - but something in between?!

        - Other car rentals do it as well. We rented some Iveco van to move furniture from Europcar lately.

        Paperwork, here's your key, this is the generic direction the van is. Enter van, be surprised it's automatic, start it up, shift into D, be even more surprised it has a second parking brake. Driving to the destination, another surprise: the car only goes up to 96km/h, no limiter seems to be active. Discover by accident that theres two driving modes: Eco and Power - switch to Power and you can drive faster facepalm.

        • jsjohnst 8 hours ago

          > Same procedure when you buy one (source: i did) - paperwork, here's your keycards, follow me onto the lot, mount license plate, bye!

          They offered to do way more for me, I politely declined.

          > Tesla themselves do this. If you book a test drive, you'll get emails where they tell you to watch a list of Youtube videos on how to handle the car.

          This is different though, you intentionally went in to drive a Tesla, that puts more onus on you. You didn’t go to pick up a Mazda and then got switched to a Tesla as an “upgrade.”

          > Other car rentals do it as well.

          I had the same thought and have used that point in debates in the past on this topic. For some reason, electric is different to people and they just won’t accept logic and reason. What’s different about getting a Tesla when expecting a Taurus vs getting a manual transmission diesel U-Haul truck when expecting automatic and gasoline?

    • tedajax 7 hours ago

      Ahead of the market maybe but Teslas just suck eggs.

joecot 19 hours ago

I bought a used Nissan Versa from Hertz and regretted it immensely. Not only did the CVT transmission go on me (it took a while for my year's class action lawsuit, but they did offer me ... $1k on a new Nissan. No thanks), but Hertz is terrible at their maintenance and uses the cheapest parts possible.

The only good thing about Teslas from Hertz is that there aren't any third party parts to cheap out on, but I still wouldn't trust a Tesla that was maintained by Hertz.

  • mixdup 19 hours ago

    They've owned them for such a short period of time, and the maintenance on an EV is so much less, that may not be a big issue

nunez 15 hours ago

They've been doing that since forever; not a Tesla thing. Enterprise and Avis do it too.

shiroiushi 21 hours ago

Sounds like a good way to go to jail, when Hertz sells you the car and then reports it as stolen to the police. Hertz does this very, very frequently to paying customers.

  • tzs 21 hours ago

    Wasn't that Hertz reporting rental cars as stolen, because Hertz lost track of them and assumed that the last renter had never returned them?

    This would be Hertz selling cars. Even if they later mistakenly reported them as stolen the buyer should not be at risk of jail because the car would be registered to the buyer in the state's records.

    • shiroiushi 20 hours ago

      If Hertz can't handle a simple rental transaction correctly without calling the police and resulting in a false arrest, I'm certainly not going to trust them to handle a car sale correctly.

      • tzs 10 hours ago

        The big difference is that with a sale there is paperwork filed with the state showing that the car is yours. If Hertz gets confused and still reports the car stolen that shoukd clear things up with police and prosecutors.

        If Hertz botches it so badly that the state paperwork cannot be correctly filed you will find that out shortly after buying the car and can get it corrected.

  • a12k 21 hours ago

    .

nunez 4 hours ago

So I only rent EVs when I travel. I specifically seek out Teslas, as I love driving them (I have two), but any EV works for me.

Besides the Tesla business model being, essentially, a huge flex from previous leadership that Elon and team were happy to enable, there were always numerous problems with renting Teslas at scale:

1. The experience of using a Tesla is unlike any other car out there. No other car lacks an engine/HVDC start button, for example. This hurt Hertz in both directions: time-stressed business travelers (many of whom don't have EVs at home) get fed up with trying to get them out of the parking lot (where a surprisingly high number of accidents involving Teslas have occurred), and leisure travelers who _do_ have time struggle to operate the car during their trip.

2. Charging. Everything about charging frustrates renters. Finding superchargers. Waiting 20+ minutes to charge, regardless of what's in the vicinity. (Many superchargers, especially in small markets, are behind malls.) Dealing with non-Tesla networks. (You don't need an app and an account to gas up an ICE vehicle.) Charging at scale is much better than it was when Hertz doubled down on this in 2022 but just isn't there yet.

2b. Many Hertz centers (including airport-attached ones!) didn't have charging infrastructure of their own. This was extremely problematic when a time-stressed renter decides to one-way their car to some other center with this predicament. Those EVs are either taken out of rotation for the day, which is extremely suboptimal, or, worse, are rented out at whatever state of charge they have. I've been assigned cars with a 2% SoC before. This is no big deal for me if there's a charging center nearby, but a renter who is IDGAF about their car (many/most business travelers) will take that sucker out of the lot and be calling roadside in an hour because their car died. This would never happen with a n ICE (since most people know how gas gauges work).

3. Repairing Teslas at the speeds that rental car companies require isn't possible without extra staff and a Tesla Service Center nearby. Tesla is Apple-like in their parts inventory. IIRC, You need to be a Tesla-approved service center to order parts from them. Once you do get the parts, (1) of my list applies again. EVs from legacy OEMs don't have this problem, but you still need techs who are certified in handling HV and EV drivetrains to work on them. That costs money, and car rental companies operate on razor thin margins.

The saddest thing about all of this is that Tesla wrote a really cool adapter for their car key auth flow that enabled Hertz renters to add the car to the Tesla app during their rental. The card key wasn't required when this was done. This was ONLY added to Hertz vehicles. I don't think Tesla intends on extending this to the rest of the fleet.

I primarily rent with Avis (who, unlike Hertz, still has a reasonably sized EV fleet). Having to use the card key for everything is annoying, especially in cold weather climates.

Which brings me to my last point. Hertz is divesting ALL of their EVs, not just their Tesla ones. It used to be stupidly easy to rent an EV with Hertz. These days, you'll be lucky to rent an EV with them at even their largest centers.

That said, assuming this next administration at least tries to continue subsidizing national charging networks and EV production (unlikely, especially if their EV or bust by 2030 mandate is rolled back), I hope that Hertz and others revisit EVs at scale in the future.

jgalt212 a day ago

Yet, TSLA is trading at an all time high and 127 PE.

https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/TSLA/

  • chgs a day ago

    The market is anticipating large amounts of corruption

    Remember when Jimmy Carter had to sell his peanut farm?

  • talldayo 21 hours ago

    With a username like jgalt you'd better have knocked on wood when you clicked that "add comment" button.

  • freen a day ago

    Kleptocracy is a word for a very real reason.

  • pstuart a day ago

    Priced on the promises of Musk rather than the reality of the market.