Source: Thedrive Archive: Ghost
Back in April, we reported on how Hertz was planning to employ artificial intelligence to scan vehicles before and after renters use them, to check for damages and issue associated charges. The AI system has been live now for a few months at select locations around the country, and one customer of Hertz-owned Thrifty reached out to The Drive to share his experience after one of the company’s scanners caught damage on his rental. Mind you, it wasn’t exactly an experience he enjoyed.
A reader named Patrick recently rented a Volkswagen from Hertz’s location at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport in Atlanta, which was in fact the first store nationwide to use the tech. When he returned the car, he did so with a 1-inch scuff on the driver’s side rear wheel. Patrick says he was alerted to the damage “minutes” after dropping the VW off, and with it, charges for the blemish: $250 for the repair, $125 for processing, and another $65 administrative fee. That’s $440 all told, for curb rash on one wheel.
This is all relayed to renters like Patrick over a web app, and while it’s easy to guess what the repair fee is for, the other two are a bit more vague on the surface. Hertz defines the processing fee as “the cost to detect and estimate the damage that occurred during your rental.” The admin fee, meanwhile, “covers a portion of the costs [Hertz incurs] as a result of processing your claim.” Hertz is working with UVeye for this tech, an Israel-based company that is wholly focused on deploying AI to automate vehicle inspections.
The web app presents customers with proof of the damage spotted by UVeye’s scanners, and allows them to compare that against an image of the same portion of the vehicle before they drove it. When Patrick was served with the bill, he was given the option to pay it right away. But here’s what’s interesting: He says Hertz was offering a $52 discount if he agreed to the terms and paid within two days, or a $32.50 discount if he paid within a week.
Patrick told The Drive that he wanted to inquire about the charge. Unfortunately, the chatbot system that Hertz uses for handling damage claims doesn’t currently allow a live, human agent to enter the conversation. What it can do is flag a claim, so that an agent reviews it later. After that point, an agent may reach out to the customer to discuss the issue, or the customer could ring up Thrifty’s normal support hotline to talk to a rep there. But that option wasn’t made clear to Patrick on the site, so he followed a “Contact Us” link to send Thrifty an email, which can take up to 10 days for a response. Remember: The discount only stands if you pay in seven days.
The Drive reached out to Hertz to inquire about Patrick’s case, and ask some questions about Hertz’s AI scanning policies at large. A representative responded with the following statement: “The vast majority of rentals are incident-free. When damage does occur, our goal is to enhance the rental experience by bringing greater transparency, precision, and speed to the process. Digital vehicle inspections help deliver on that with clear, detailed documentation that is delivered more quickly, as well as a more technology-enabled resolution process.”
One of the questions I asked Hertz that the company didn’t answer was whether fees for customers who have incidents are higher when renting vehicles from Hertz stores that use UVeye scanners, as opposed to those that don’t. You’d think they would be more expensive, if indeed the processing fee pertains to “the cost to detect and estimate” blemishes sustained during rentals. As it stands, Hertz has no listed prices on its website for estimates of what different kinds of damage typically cost, so customers are kind of in the dark about this stuff until it happens.
At the time of publication, Patrick said he hadn’t paid yet and wouldn’t take the discount because “saving $30 to accept responsibility is not worth it,” he told me over email.
Hertz using AI in this way represents new practices and protocols for the industry, and it’s something consumers will need time to adjust to. The company claims UVeye’s tech increases transparency when it comes to damage claims and, sure—you can see exactly what the scanners caught, and the turnaround is clearly quick. But this system has arguably introduced opacity when customers can’t easily talk to a live agent for questions or concerns, and the software is encouraging them to pay up as quickly as possible.
I’d argue it would go a long way for Hertz to incorporate live agents into its chatbot system, to ease some of the friction here. But whether or not it does, Patrick’s experience is the kind many car renters will likely have in increasing numbers, as more companies follow Hertz’s lead and incorporate AI into these inspections. As for Hertz itself, it expects to have scanners up and running at 100 of its roughly 1,600 U.S. airport locations by the end of this year.
