Hertz is installing UVeye inspection portals at its biggest U.S. airports this year. Atlanta was the first, but they expect to hit 100 airports before 2025 is over.
Now they scan cars as they’re being returned – vehicles drive through a camera‑and‑sensor tunnel and get an ‘MRI for vehicles’ to log damage in a way that rental staff never did before. It also finds hard to spot damage such as under the vehicle, uneven tire wear, hairline cracks in the windshield.
It seems that hotels may be getting ready to follow suit.
[H]otels, for instance, are already using AI-powered sensors to monitor air quality and trigger fines for smoking or vaping in rooms. But Hollander warns that sometimes the sensors trigger false positives.
“Like someone using a hairdryer or aerosol spray — and guests get hit with $500 charges without ever lighting up. It’s not hard to imagine how that could go south quickly,” Hollander said.
..“They’re using AI more to flag potential issues — like a room that smells off, linens that don’t meet standards, or maintenance problems — and then looping in a human for the final call,” Hollander said. For now, the AI is acting more like a very observant assistant than a judge and jury.
“But it’s clear that hotels are heading in the same direction,” he said. “Between computer vision that can detect damage or wear in a room, and AI that analyzes guest behavior or room conditions in real time, the tech is already there.”
The problem with Hertz AI scanning of vehicles before and after rental is:
- They take photos at different angles and in different lighting, so pre-existing damage may be missed at the start of the rental, and blamed on the customer when the car is returned
- It represents a shift from not whacking every customer for every ding (normal wear and tear) to going after 5x more customers for things that used to be too minor to bother with
- They layer on multiple sets of fees, and apply their own damage estimates, so the costs they pursue against the customer seem disproportionate and unreasonable
- And they discount the charges for customers who pay right away – while eliminating the discounts for those who argue (because getting a response to any dispute over the charges pushes the customer beyond the window for ‘discounting’ to a more reasonable charge).
The problem with hotels adopting a Hertz model of scanning rooms for damage, scuffs, furniture out of place or missing items mirrors the frustrations customers have with Hertz but goes absolutely beyond those.
- The AI scanners watch the room. How do you know they aren’t monitoring you while you are in the room? There’s a huge privacy violation in having what’s (temporarily) your personal space watched by an AI.
- The damage might be done by housekeeping, but the guest gets blamed!
Plus, there hotels are so much more competitive. There really aren’t great rental car companies. It’s a terrible business, with mostly a terrible product. You can leave Hertz (and you probably should) but Avis is only marginally better. National looks good by comparison, but there’s no real premium rental car experience at scale. Hotels, on the other hand, could actually win business by promising to respect their guests.
(HT: Gene)
It takes only one rental from Hertz where they falsely accuse you of damaging their car and charging you an insane amount for repairs and lost business to make you realize that it’s worth using rideshare. One time alone could be a years worth of ride share
I imagine the credit card companies who offer CDW on car rentals will deal with this and disallow hertz (like they now disallow rentals in certain countries).
Any hotels that try this crap will be instantly blacklisted from any potential business I may give them in the future. Screw that crap. I’ll stick with hotels that aren’t trying to nickel and dime you from behind without even the courtesy of a reach around.
What is that Sting and The Police said:
Every breath you take..
And every move you make..
Every bond you break..
Every step you take..
I’ll be watching you..
Absurd invasion of privacy, but I guess no one cares anymore. We really should be fighting this.
The Hertz “discount window” is pretty vicious.
Reminds me of the legal system where you plead guilty to a much lesser crime and get the certainty of knowing you won’t go to trial and risk being found guilty of serious offense.
Regarding hotels, I would not stay at a hotel using AI to monitor a room that I was occupying.
Regarding Hertz, why does anyone use them at all? I certainly would not.
I travel to the same city every other week for work (among other cities it hit regularly).
This pushed me to bite the bullet and buy a used car to have in town. Cuts down on costs and eliminates any surprises. In the end I save a couple hundred bucks a month.
Hertz made their choice. I made mine. Elite status with rental car companies come with no benefits so I don’t feel like I’m losing anything. In fact, I’m getting a nice car…that’s mine.
When you mentioned room monitoring, my eyebrows went up. I’d want a lot more info on this before I’d stay at a hotel using that. That sounds really creepy.
Yeah….not a fan.
Still not over it, them calling it the “MRI for vehicles” still doesn’t make sense to me.
@1990 — Good song!
@Parker — Smart, sounds like the right move.
@greggb57 — Nice picture! @1990 will appreciate that as well.
What’s next? Hotels using AI to figure out which travelers are refilling their minis from the big bottles of shampoo and conditioner in the shower? Auuughhhhhh!!!!!!!1!
@ JimC2 — Hotels will soon install “AI” devices that will only release one serving of shampoo/conditioner/shower gel per registered guest per day. Same goes for toilet paper. Need more? Bring your own!
Why would instay in this kind of hotel hahahah
Enterprise/alamo sacked us$300 in the UK for a scratched tire and my friend got the same when she was in Northern Ireland a month later. Is this a trend
Gary, none of this shit is AI. We’ve had the ability to monitor air quality in a hotel room, or xray scan a car for years. All this was doable without LLMs.
Please stop repeating company’s marketing spin. It’s just using sensors in new customer unfriendly ways
@ Tomri — Not a trend, but a SCAM. Maybe more of us should try this:
Good article, thanks Gary. You mention “there’s no real premium rental car experience at scale”, maybe that’s true for premium-only, but National clearly offers that experience. I’ve been in the National Executive tier for over a decade, and they have BMW’s and Audi’s available, clearly premium cars. That’s certainly a sliver of what they rent, but those vehicles are available.
@greggb57 @ L737 — Nice! “Bite my shiny metal…”
Hate to say it but Ireland is ALWAYS a rental car scam with their bs charges overflowing.
Avis /Budget used to be better than the rest, but no longer.
Soon people will tire of the relentless gouging behavior of rental and airlines as well as hotels. I can only hope it is sooner than later.
What about Sixt?
Just rented from them again 2-weeks ago (at LAX).
Also rent from Sixt for local needs & regional trips closer to our NYC home.
Fantastic selection of vehicles.
Excellent customer service every time since we switched to Sixt 2-years ago.
Click bait
@Howard Miller — I’m with you on Sixt. Have been renting from them more and more, lately, and just booking directly, getting the QR code, skipping lines. At least in the USA, they’ve had a wider selection of premium and luxury vehicles (and not even much more expensive than ‘budget’ options with competitors). Like, I rented from them at DEN recently, and for the SUV category, I got a practically brand-new (just 1,200 miles) Mercedes GLE, which was a pleasant surprise.
Wow! Coffee maker ramen and iron grilled cheese are dead! I suppose it’ll still be ok to wash clothes in the sink and make jello in the tub.
It’s already started.
Search online for “Pell Hotel Smoking Sensors” and read up on how one Hyatt-affiliated property is using room sensors to detect (and charge $500 penalties for) smoking and guests are adamantly insisting they did not smoke in the room.
Just avoid such car rental company and hotel. Plain and simple. They surely need us more than we need them, considering the competition in car rental and hotel.
Make no mistake, these companies have declared war on their customers. We need a database to help us avoid them.
Hertz has been prosecuting customers for theft long after they returned the rental car on time, not honoring reservations and doubling the price of the car reservation when you go to pick up your rental car rt least 4 years. At this point, doing business with Hertz is akin to self immolation.Forc those that care, Hertz doesn’t pay their bills.
I was a Hertz customer almost exclusively for 25+ years with close to a 1000 rentals. News of fake AI charging for hallucinatory damage was all it took to immediately end my business relationship with them. Business decisions have consequences.
I don’t rent cars, at least not in the States because I don’t travel domestically, but I think the solution to Hertz’s AI is to buy their insurance and beat the hell out of their cars.
Everyone saying “just avoid the companies that do this” is missing that you can’t avoid it when everyone does it. Even if only most do it, you’ll find yourself paying more to stay at the hotels don’t.
I rented from a company using these vehicle scanners in Amsterdam earlier this year with no issues. The technology appeared to be lidar scanner based, not vision camera based. So the damage reported is “real”, not a trick of the lighting. The problem is not having a human in the loop to ask “does this damage actually necessitate repair or is it normal wear and tear covered by the daily rental fee?”. Without that assessment a rental agency will be paid to replace a door panel dozens of times over their 3 year ownership of the vehicle – without ever actually making the repairs.
I’m so happy they didn’t have this when I returned a car in nicaragua. I had accidentally had a few drinks and driven it off the edge of a parking area with a 12 foot drop. Luckily it stopped when it was still balancing over the edge and in the morning I had somebody with a chain, dragged me back onto the parking lot. I’m pretty sure if you had done a scam underneath the car it would not have looked good
@Marcus Price — I know they say ‘don’t believe everything you read on the internet,’ but if you’re admitting to driving under the influence, even if Nicaragua doesn’t care, I think you meant that you ‘had a few drinks’ then ‘accidentally drove your rental car off the edge,’ not that you ‘accidentally had a few drinks,’ because it’s hard to ‘accidentally’ drink. I know, semantics. Maybe don’t drink and drive is the actual lesson of your totally-real story.
@1990 @Marcus Price — Perhaps not the most “PRI,M” and proper night. Good thing a devious bird didn’t land on the hood of the car!
To clarify @ David G’s comment, DO NOT STAY at The Pell Hotel by JvD in Middlettown, RI or the Hyatt Regency Bethesda, unless you want to be charged a fraudulent $500 scam fee for smoking in your room. I can only imagine the field day lawyers could have with this bs. If this happens to you, please initiate a chargeback to your credit card. If that doesn’t work, please file a small claims suit. I imagine that the hotel cannot possibly prove their case and won’t be willing to spend money hiring their own attorney to fight you.
Always video/photo around a rental car yourself before you leave the lot. Best way to prove previous damage existed. Rental agents are way to fast to push cars out & may miss something. This has saved me a few times.
My son works at a rental car company and they’re definitely using AI to scan for damages. He said it’s crazy and feels horrible for customers. He fortunately left a few weeks ago
What a way to shoo your customers away!
@L737 — Perhaps… Bob Barker would say… the (Marcus) Price is WRONG!
Is there even a shred of truth to this story?
Why would anyone in their right mind trust anything coming from a media outlet or any person that is not currently telling the world that we have the Truth that is the cure and prevention of all needless and preventable suffering and death: “Life is Most Important in Life is The Most Important Truth in Life” that has just been placed freely in your pwn hands ad does most certainly exist?
Anything at all that doesn’t agree with that Truth is always a flat out lie.
Perhaps they don’t want you to know that and so should not be trusted until they do publicly acknowledge receipt and correctness of it? You think?
@David Wishengrad — What even is ‘Truth’ with the capital ‘T,’ like you’re saying? Like, do you mean objective reality, backed by empirical evidence, or are you just referring to the President’s propaganda/social media company?
@David Wishengrad – “Life is Most Important in Life is The Most Important Truth in Life” is perhaps the most incoherent and asinine thing I’ve ever read. I’m not sure what type(s) of substances you are smoking, but you may need to take a break sir.
Interesting devices. You can’t find out exactly how they work and they’re all leased rather than sold — one vendor offers sensors starting at a bit under “$100 a month”. To underscore the rental model they’re “cloud based” — its a rented service unlike the authentic smoke detector in the room.
What that means to the typical customer is that unless those units discover at least one smoking miscreant a month then they’re just a drain on revenue. This gives the vendor — and the hotelier — a ‘pecuniary interest’ in finding smoke or vapes with no recourse by the customer to question the finding. Since we’re from California where smoking hasn’t been much of a thing for decades now there’s a risk we’ll get caught with no kind of due process. Best avoid these facilities.
I like National. The people on the ground are always service-oriented, upbeat, and have a core humanity that keeps me coming back. They want good reviews in exchange, but I’m willing to do that to keep this level of service.
The cars are also well-maintained and the added status I have with Amex business platinum means I get a somewhat higher-end car.
Their call center is a bit stilted, but considering the rest of the operation, I’m a loyal customer.
AI “Your 60 second shower will start now”
I seem to have missed the bit in the article about the missing hairdryer.
I was scammed by Thrifty in Munich Germany. Car was dirty and wet when picked up. I was charged 800 Euros for micro chip on windshield. I never rented from Dollar/Thrifty ever again. American Express refused to honor insurance and I was stuck paying 800 Euros. It ended relationships with Amex and Thrift/Dollar. Voting with your feet is a great policy. It’s en̈ding my 5 star Presidents relationship with Hertz. Ì use ride share frequently now.
@David Wishengrad
Dear Lord, what kind of Trumpian word salad is this?
Do you even have a point at all?
Drugs are bad…Mmmmkay!?
Scanning vehicle underside for scratches? Don’t recommend driving on gravel/unpaved roads, potholes, beaches, parks, mud, etc any surface other than a smooth racetrack.
Hotel AI?? Are you kidding? Just call it Epsteins Island for obvious reasons. Victory for exhibitionists. Just wait for the blackmail insurance.
It may have been a coincidence, but shortly after Hertz’ AI announcement, I drove by a Hertz. There were cars everywhere. Even up and down the road. I think the powers that be were just hoping all of the other car rental companies would quickly join their club. The AI choice may have been a terrible move.
Not hotels single handedly making Airbnb sound more attractive again lol
Wash the vehicle before you return the vehicle but don’t dry it. The scanner wo t be able to detect damage
People will stop renting cars and hotels they will put themselves out of business. People are no longer stupid.
It will get air bnbs more work. Not smart . Like food raise prices so much people will stop buying them they go out of business. People are sick of these greedy ass companies hungry for more cash. They will end up with none….
I was recently in Las Vegas and upon our return, my bank called about possible fraud on my card. The hotel had charged me $500 for smoking in our room. WE DO NOT SMOKE! Or vape or anything like that. They never called us or gave us an opportunity to dispute it. We had to dispute with our card and we were credited back. Ridiculous!!
Exactly why we no longer rent from Hertz! Or, Sixt in Europe – 4 stellar Sixt rentals could not outweigh the outrageous scam and harassment courtesy of the Venice Airport location.
Smokers are another aggravation, and we’ll no longer be lenient about reporting those who do. At one hotel we often frequent, we can smell the smoke but can’t see the smokers. I can, however, narrow the room down to 3 choices, which security should be able to sort out.
Having a credit card company that will always back you up in a dispute situation is worth its weight in gold!
One of the main reasons I’ve rented from Hertz is the hassle-free return and pick up of the cars. Unlike places like Enterprise that are scams waiting to ding you on something.
I’ve never had an issue with them in the last 20 years.
However if they go to this model a lot of long-time customers like myself will have to reevaluate our choice.
Can guests fine the hotel when they can prove the bedding wasn’t changed, there are bed bugs, the hair dryer or iron doesn’t work, the room doesn’t smell clean, etc?
@MPirro — You’re the second person who’s said Sixt in Europe didn’t treat them well; I’ve had incredible experiences with them in the USA, and a ‘fine’ rental in Prague, but I take it, depending on the location or country, Sixt may not be what it is elsewhere. Good to know about VCE, though, I doubt many folks ‘drive’ in actual Venice… ya know, canals, etc. Bah!
I told Hertz to go screw themselves 5 years ago when they tried the smoking in the car bit with me. I must have spent around $50k since them with AVIS who actually signed a business account with my company that allows us to smoke in cars if we choose, no charge. HERTZ sucks
Why would you title the article “Guests-fined-500-for-misusing-hotel hairdryer” and not include anything about this incident?
Clickbait!