Generally speaking, travelers like renting from airports – despite all the extra fees – because the major rental car companies just haven’t worried about minor nicks and scrapes on vehicles. Hertz, Avis and National are high volume, and these locations tend to be high revenue as well. So renters tend not to get nickeled and dimed (often for minor damage that they didn’t do to the vehicle).

While it’s always advisable to take photos and videos of vehicles prior to renting, the hassle over minor dings just tends not to come into play with major car rental chains at major airports. This may be about to change.

Hertz is installing more than 100 UVeye inspection portals at its biggest U.S. airport stations, starting with Atlanta, and full deployment is expected by the end of the year.

They’ll have returning vehicles drives through a camera‑and‑sensor tunnel. These devices, dubbed “MRI for vehicles” flag anomalies and creating a digital record. The original use case for the Uveye technology was detecting contraband/explosives.

• This helps Hertz identify problems with cars quicker and keep them in service to rent next.
  
• But it also logs customer damage, in a way that rental agency staff often don’t.
  
• And it spots hard to find damage (undercarriage, uneven tire wear, hairline windshield cracks).

Portion of Car Scanned		Typical faults caught
Undercarriage		frame cracks, leaks, brake/exhaust issues, missing parts
Tires + wheels		tread depth, sidewall bubbles, pressure, rim damage, mismatched sizes
Full body		dents, paint chips, glass cracks, missing trim

Hertz is heavily focused on costs after a $2.86 billion 2024 loss tied to EV‑fleet depreciation, and this is one way to control costs and potentially seek reimbursement from customers.

Expect this to spread to other rental companies. Enterprise – know for their excruciating vehicle walkarounds (which help upsell insurance in addition to catching vehicle damage) – is piloting similar technology and Avis has discussed plans for trials.