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.
Which means there is a “prior record” that can be compared to. So yes the level of scrutiny is higher but so is the actual record of what the car was like when you got it. If (big if but a court case will force it) they give you both reports when trying to collect money i see no issue.
Bill Ackman has bought a very substantial stake in Hertz. And his new pet vehicle will be a nuisance or financial disaster for those renting cars in America just like his newfound masters Lutnick and Tr*mp are a disaster for the country.
Already avoid Hertz over their long running false stolen vehicle fiasco but now yet another reason to avoid.
Having car rental insurance applicable to damage claims will become even more important for renters as there will be a lot more claims made by the rental car agencies. This can turn out to be much worse than even Sixt.
If they are going to do thi returning, then I’d want to drive out through the system and get a record of exactly what the back lot put on the line.
This should work both ways.
Unless they’re driving it through the this tunnel when you pick up the car as well as drop it off, it’s still an inadequate record. Lots can happen to a vehicle between the time it’s returned and the time it’s re-rented.
@GUWonder
that’s
President Trump to you.
@ Gary — This is great news for Uber and lyft, bad news for hotels with paid parking. This technology and its undoubted use to screw consumers will certainly tilt me in strong favor or completely avoiding car rentals.
Somebody is making a lot of money off these things, and if anyone follows that trail it should be easy to see all sorts of fingers in the pie. (It was pretty easy to do the same thing with the “miraculous” equipment TSA has gotten over the years.) Bottom line: Orwell was an optimist.
These days, everything feels like it’s becoming ‘might makes right’ and ‘pretext,’ rather than truth and fairness, so I expect abuse here. No one seems to want to ‘do the right thing’ or ‘treat each other well’ anymore. So, within the context of rental car companies, it’s yet another example of a big company using technology to ‘steal’ from consumers. I suppose it’s easier for them to do this than to actually run a functional business and ‘earn’ their money.
As to some of the commenters who immediately went political–nothing wrong with that–however, I’m not sure the President directly has anything to do with this; but his entire ‘ethos’ is dirty-tricks like this, and generally, de-regulation, so consumers are often the victims of these schemes. As I’ve said on here many times: The fish rots at the head. And as we face greater economic strife in the coming months, we should expect more and more games to be played against us. It’s disappointing to say the least.
As far as what we can do as consumers… well, first off, try to deny, delay, and decline paying for such alleged ‘damages,’ especially if you did not actually make them or they are insignificant (‘a millimeter scratch?!’).
Of course, if you do becoming in a dispute, stop bringing that company more business–like, cancel future bookings, go to a competitor if you still need future rentals, easy lessons learned there.
Next, if your credit card has rental car insurance coverage, go through that process–it’s not a panacea–there are often exceptions, usually a tedious bureaucracy, and it takes awhile, so be prepared to fight. Expect to be charged some exorbitant fees, then dispute those charges, and possibly lose in that process, too.
Finally, if needed, hire qualified legal counsel, and take them to court. Better to fight it so that these companies don’t get ‘easy wins’ and keep doing this to us and others. We as consumers can ‘deter’ them from this nonsense if we fight back. That’s our system at the moment. Wish it were better.
There needs to be a scan on the way out if there’s a scan on the way in. Otherwise, who knows what damage might be there when the car is rented. Especially undercarriage damage that nobody can see. I foresee numerous claims of “you drove over something and dented something in the undercarriage” which are very difficult to verify.
Wonder how many of these cars will not get repaired but they will still collect the money for the damage, couldn’t that be insurance fraud?
And who is going to be able to make sure the machines are precisely correct and not making any errors — nearly all of which will probably tend to favor the car rental company at the detriment to the renter who caused no more “damage” to the car’s value than could be expected from normal wear and tear? The honesty and reliability level of big business people in the country and their pet managers are going to be part and parcel of showing how a naive fool and their money are soon parted (for all sorts of bad reasons).
If there is a rise in Credit Card Rental Claims, credit cards will just end up dropping Hertz
The scan should also be done on check out and a digital copy of the results attached to the rental record so that the customer can review it. I don’t necessarily see a scan as a bad thing if it is done right. I remember seeing a rental car agent back one car into another car in the rental return garage, breaking the turn signal lens. I have also found turn signal lens damage on a car I was assigned to rent. It is why I run my fingers lightly over all lenses to catch cracks that I may not notice with my eyes. Also, if the area I am renting from is poorly lit, I will still take photos but I will also take photos again as soon as I get in a well lit area. I think the rental garage in BUF is dimly lit on purpose but I have never been dinged for extra charges there. I was dinged for a tiny front window crack at Enterprise once that I was pretty sure was there prior to my rental. Nothing I could do about it. All but impossible to see on photos. At least the charge was reasonable. It was fixed with a simple drill and fill (with resin). If I see imperfections on windows, I will look closer and run my fingers lightly over them to determine if there is a pit in the window or if there is something stuck on.
It’s bad enough that Hertz has a habit of getting people arrested and sent to jail for bad record keeping on their part; next they will x-ray cars. It’s just a matter of time before a parent leaves their sleeping child in the back seat and Hertz will blast them with their Death Star technology.
Just experienced this when I brought my car to the service department at the dealership. A scan is made as you pull in, including the wheel alignment. Should you make a claim of damage by the service department, the scan reflects the exact status of the vehicle when you arrived.
For the rental agency to make claim of damage, they would need a scan as you left the agency and when you returned. Without a before and after, I smell class action status!!
Berta hasn’t been a consumer/oriented business since going through bankruptcy.
Rental rates often uncompetitive, service degradation, aging fleet. The last straw for me was their recharging policies for EVs…which they failed to disclose. Don’t bring the car back fully charged and they start hitting you with crazy recharging fees.
You can rest assured this new technology is designed for Hertz to make more money. There would be other reason to invest in it
So is this technogy X-ray, MRI, or UV? 🙂
As mentioned above, useful for places like undercarriage but must be done both sides on way out and in
While the concept seems reasonable, ultimately it’s about the money just like everything else. If a human can’t see a scratch just let it go! Sheesh.
@Gary – Please don’t use “x-ray” generically. I thought it was literal until I watched the video, and from the comments, I was not the only one confused by this. You aren’t the first writer I’ve seen do it this month, but both instances were frustrating because they had absolutely nothing to do with x-ray technologies.
My first thoughts had been about how this would be accomplished to avoid health impacts/risks. Then when I saw the first part of the video, I thought, “holy hell, there’s NO WAY I’m renting from Hertz if they’re making me drive through 2 x-ray machines!” Then they showed the cameras and it was clear it’s just high-resolution photos.
High-res photos will have their own issues, but are probably reasonable if coupled with a reasonable human process for disputes. I don’t expect Hertz to get the human process right, considering their recent history. However, this is nothing like an x-ray; for example, I cannot see any interior damage. I could have removed an entire seat and these cameras would very likely miss it. Even if they analyzed the interior, there are too many ways it can reconfigured to expect reasonable results (e.g. is seat gone or this vehicle just allows a fully flat recline in that seat?).
FWIW I think it’s cool tech, and I’d be excited for National’s rates to drop if/when they adopt it (since damage will be properly attributed, lowering overall costs). I just have zero faith in Hertz’s ability to pull this off. Interesting use case I’d not considered!
@jamesb2147 — Right, this is what I was getting at in my own jestful way. You looked into this more deeply than I did but sounds like no radiation at all! Ionizing or nonionizing. Phew. Wouldn’t want to be in a car undergoing a MRI either (I know that was meant as an analogy).
Surely if CT technology was implemented, Hertz wouldn’t make people wouldn’t be in the car, right? Right? *Padme Star Wars Meme*
Any bets that even though they “scan” the car when you return it, they will still have people arrested for not returning it?
The fact the cars aren’t scanned on the exit proves what the main focus of these devices are.
Yet another reason to avoid hertz.
The flaw with this driving thru the tunnel at exit after pickup meaning you can dispute damage as caused by an employee prior to pickup.
I rented a car from an in-town Hertz office yesterday. They offered/provided a set of (before departure) photos of
the car they were renting me at the time. This was the first time I experienced that. I returned it after hours so I don’t know if they took more photos (after return) to compare with. And I don’t know if I should trust the before pictures. They could have been done anytime.
Ya know, it’s people like the a*****e Walter Barry who would interject his political stance into a conversation that has NOTHING to do with the topic. I agree that if “Fartz” is going to scan the car as it comes in, then the next renter should be entitled to see the results of the “IN” scan before accepting the rental. Even then, the scanning system could make a mistake and NOT notice some damage that neither it nor my camera caught before taking the rental. I see a huge legal problem that “Fartz” will encounter…not to mention the renter. I got burned once in SFO (why is that not a surprise) but luckily, I had photos and the metadata of my photographs supported my assertion that the damage occurred before I took the car. And to the comment about Sixt….I would rather walk than to use any of their services. HORRIBLE company.
Just how good is this tech at differentiating actual damage from “temporary issues”? For example could a streak of tar or a bug splat be misinterpreted as a scratch? Or a trick of lighting/reflection be seen as a dent?
Sure I’ll still take my own pics and video…but will the rental car companies take the position that “our high tech AI scanner takes precedence over your cell phone video”? To that point, I’d read the rental contract carefully to ensure there isn’t some language to that effect.
So with this if I’m at a hotel that’s valet only, I plan to bog down the drop off lane while I take excruciatingly detailed video of the car before letting the valet drive it off.
That’s fine IF you can get them to pass it through the machine as you pick up the car. If they scan it, have an employee park it, leaving it unattended for hours, days or possibly weeks, and anybody nearby can scratch it or hit it with a door, then I will have no guarantee that I’d see something that only a scanner would find.
I’ve dealt with companies that want to walk around looking for every little scratch on the return side but leave it up to the renter to do so on the way out. It was worth sticking with companies like Hertz and not having to worry about it. But if Hertz is going to do that, I might as well go with the cheaper company.
A company called Wenn has been doing this for a couple of years in Europe (FRA for sure, they might be in OSL as well)
Scans when you leave and when you return and looks for the differences.
They had to use “Mechanical Turks” for a few years but I think it is now fully automated.
https://www.wenn.no/our-mission
Honestly, it makes sense to me.
Great. “Are you sure you don’t want the CDW”?
This could be OK or could be ripe for abuse. Chips and scrapes? Those aren’t going to turn up on their own. Frame* cracks, uneven tire wear, alignment? It could be from the current driver being rough on the vehicle — or it could be from deferred maintenance. You can have metal fatigue from previous drivers being rough on the vehicle, and that front end (or possibly rear end) came out of alignment, or frame rail piece cracked, without the current driver being rough at all.
*Or whatever — technically a lot of vehicles are unibody and don’t have a frame. But whatever.
@Walter Barry, I’ll say it much more politely than @Win Whitmire… for real. This has nothing to do with politics, even tangentially.
Hertz already a no – I don’t want to be shot by the police.
This makes it a super hard no. You can’t do an underbody exam on the car and have to trust the system? They will need to recoup the costs of the machines – like the cities and red-light cameras. They will likely set a minimum damage to be ‘found’ on every car returned.
They can also cause you of stealing their car. It hurts to rent from hertz.
I was a Five Star President’s Circle member. When Hertz started having customers arrested for “not returning their cars” I stopped using Hertz. Ackman will drive the share price up and then sell. No issue with that. But thinking Hertz will return to its once lofty status is a pipedream,
Can we ever really trust a company that has a history of falsely reporting hundreds of their customers for felonious Auto theft? The technology may be great, but ultimately it’s the management that decides how to use it or misuse it.
Stop arresting our customers? *crickets*
MRIs for scratches? Invest millions.
Hertz makes Lyft look like a pleasure cruise.
In other news Hertz will also lock up in jail all customers who don’t pay in full for any damage charges to their vehicles coming out of the A1 tunnel on inspection.If hotel parking revenue goes down they will have to double the cost of parking rates to make up the difference
Oh what a glorious time to be a traveler 🙁
I’m old school. When I buy golf balls I select only those that are no larger than a car dent.
Rented from Avis at the new LAX car rental facility last week where this technology is already in place.
If you are over 70 years old you may not need to worry about rental car damage, some companies will not rent to you regardless since you are OLD and a risk.
@One Trippe — Name names (of those companies). That’s absurd; age discrimination. If anything, impose extra insurance premiums, but to ‘ban’ folks just on age alone. Is that in the US, or overseas? Like, if you have a valid drivers license, you should be able to get a vehicle here at least.
Half the commentators didn’t bother watching the video.
It scans the car AT PICKUP and return.
And emails a report .
You can basically ignore 90% of the comments above because they simply don’t apply.
Not rented from Hertz in awhile since they started to report rented cars as stolen along with other illegal issues. Last company no longer used them for travel either for same reason.
My dealer in Toyota Princeton uses this and I love it. It’s a fantastic technology already used by General Motors and Amazon. People see pictures before and after and if someone really crashed the car in the parking lot sorry but it really is their problem. I drive safely while welcoming the fact I don’t need to do an annoying walk around before I take the car out!
A WARNING FOR YOUR READERS: I’ve had two experiences now with rental-car automated scanning systems — both of them errors by the renting companies.
Hertz notified me over two weeks after I’d returned a car at SFO that I was being billed for damaging the driver’s side rear-view mirror, which clearly hadn’t happened on my watch. When they billed me, I noticed that the report wasn’t generated until a week afterward. When I finally was able to reach a phone rep, I told them that anything could have happened in that week — including one of Hertz’s own staff being responsible for the damage. After much back and forth, they grudgingly admitted that it wasn’t my fault, and rescinded the bill.
Sixt also billed me after a return, also at SFO: They have a full-car automated scanning portal that you drive through, and they told me there was a large but hard-to-see scratch (which, again, did not happen to me). I challenged it, and asked them to check the rental before mine. Sure enough, they admitted it was the prior renter, and rescinded the bill.
So, for all renters: Don’t just take pictures, record a video walk-around (as I do every time), at the start and especially at the end of a rental, to ensure the automated systems don’t, ah, ding you unnecessarily. And don’t be afraid to challenge their assessments. -gB
I’ve avoided hertz ever since they tried to hit me with a chipped windshield claim. Thank goodness for amex. The rep said they were very familiar in dealing with hertz over rental car issues.
This hasn’t been my experience with Enterprise at all. If anything, I’ll find additional dings in the walk-around at time of rental and be told they don’t care so long as the dings don’t affect driveability and aren’t larger than a certain size.
I can’t even count how many rental cars have had with the oil change overdue, poor alignment, warped brake rotors or other defects. Defects that were a direct result of deferred maintenance. Now they want to try to nickel and dime the consumer for small issues? Good luck. I can already see the billable hours for them claiming damage and the renter disagrees. Turo here we come.
I was scanned in and out of Newark 2 weeks ago