Budget Rent-A-Car

I wish I had read the reviews. This was the worst experience I’ve ever had with a car rental. We showed up to the airport and they had our name spelled wrong. After correcting them, they never changed it. We reserved a car and 2 car seats. We had to wait at least 20 minutes (while at our car) with a 1 and 3 yr old. All because the woman we had to get them from accidentally locked the door and didn’t have the keys. When they arrived, I asked the guy if he was going to put them in for us. Well, he didn’t speak english. We got (almost) out of the garage when we noticed 2 cracks in the windshield, a huge hole in the back bumper (with a shitty repair job) and the car was absolutely filthy! When we returned the car it was way too smoothe. Not really complaints about that. just didn’t seem right. We realized we had left my sons school bag (full of his favorite toys) in the car once we boarded our plane. I called as soon as we landed. For 2 days!!! 2 days of getting hung up on, nobody knowing who to contact, not able to call the store we rented from direct… got a # finally, but never had anyone answer, the wrong #‘s, press * to continue to hold. just to go back to the main menu. 2 days! I finally filled out a lost report online. By the time I received a survey, I let them know it all. I did get a nice email from Elisabeth that was helpful, but she still couldn’t find our bag. The airport Budget MANAGER’S # she gave me never even called me back after 3 attempts of leaving voicemails. Even though it was our fault for forgetting the bag… this is completely wrong on all levels. I will NEVER rent from them again. My husband has used Budget numerous times for his FedEx business when the routes were heavy. I guarantee that he, nor any other contractor in his terminal will EVER use them again!!! Disgusted.

We booked a couple of months in advance at the Sydney, Australia airport. We get there and there are a couple of people ahead of us, seems they didn’t have any cars available. It was a long wait. When a car was dropped off, there was one guy to wash it and get it ready for the next person. And that guy was frustrated. They knew we were coming, they should have had a car ready for us. When we complained later, we were told that Budget isn’t really affiliated with the Australia Budget, that they just use their name. Well, they’re giving Budget a bad name. We won’t be using them again.

I’m not going to lie. I checked out the Unilocal reviews before making my reservation and thought to myself, it can’t possibly be this bad. I’m sure it’ll be fine. That will be the last time I doubt Unilocal,particularly when the consensus is this bad. I have booked rentals multiple times from different companies and this was by far the worst experience I have ever had.
The story:
We arrive at the counter with our reservation in hand. Our agent, John, states that there are no cars available in our size range (intermediate) and he couldn’t give us a time frame in which the car will be available. He said the only thing he would be able to give us was a minivan. Although there were mustangs available it would be a $ 15/​day upcharge.
I was flabbergasted. I asked if there was anything they could do. I see that they partnered with Avis and if there was any way they could give us a car from their lot. He states that they pull cars from the same lot so, no, there were no cars for us on the lot. He kept stating that he could get us out here right now in a minivan which to us was absurd given its size and mileage. For us, it was not an even trade. I ask to speak to the manager. John states that he’s been working there for four years and there was absolutely nothing he could do. I said I understand but that I wanted to speak to a manager. He refused multiple times and said he didn’t even know the manager’s last name. That his first name was Erik but he was on the parking deck. All the while, John is holding on to my bf’s cc and ID. We ask for it back and he said he was going to swipe the card to hold the reservation, but I said no, why does he need to swipe the card to place a hold for a car we didn’t have. Shouldn’t the reservation we made online do that? We argue some more and miraculously a car in our range pops up. As we walk to our car, we couldn’t help but notice the ABUNDANCE of cars that were available on the lot.
Summed up, here are my gripes:
1) the car reservation I made was not available at the time of. check in. The only upgrade I was given for an intermediate car was a minivan. they tried to upcharge me for an another car despite it being their fault for not having a car
2) I asked multiple times to speak to a manager, but was refused
3) I was not given a timeframe in which I could expect a car, just that they didn’t have one on the lot and that they expect one to come in.
4) The agent would not hand us the credit card and ID back. He attempted to swipe the card despite our protests.
5) The agent kept speaking over me when I was explaining my case. I do not think I was rude. Agitated maybe, but I was trying to speak in a clear manner but he kept talking over me/​
By far, one of the worst experiences I have had while traveling. I book with major car companies so I don’t have to deal with these issues. Never again will I work with budget rental on their reservation policies alone. The fact that you are NOT guaranteed a comparable car at the rate you were promised is ridiculous. Otherwise what is the point of making a reservation.

These guys really suck. Big time warning!!! When asked if I wanted the supplemental insurance, I said NO like a million times. They slipped it into my contract and I got charged an additional $ 150. Please, don’t rent from these crooks.

Absoluetly unbelievable! Booked the trip 1 month prior to trip and not one mention they were closed when arriving after 12:00 midnight!
No signs, no help, just an empty counter with lights out!
Wow! Budget Sucks!!!

Simply put, had a horrendous start to my vacation that was made tolerable by John. He was informative, easy to work with, and gave me the options I needed. Thank You!

We planned to be in Austin last month for less than 48 hours, flying Jet Blue in and out. So we went back to the airport 18 hours before departure to pick up a one day rental. It was quiet, and there were no problems except for the extra insurance nearly doubling the rental ($ 27/​day at Austin, instead of $ 9/​day at JFK) but the weather was bad so I opted for it. It might not have been as easy had we tried picking up when many flights were arriving.
The next morning, returning the car was easy; however, the security line at 5:30am was ridiculously long, and we missed our flight. Eight hours until the next one, and the Budget agent went out of his way to help us get a car back, without charge, for the remainder of our 24 hour rental! Again, he might not have been as helpful had we not been the only customers at the counter, but our experience was great.

Took about an hour to get the car, way to long to just pick up a car. We request an economy car and reserved a month in advance. Unlike Alamo you cannot go to the lot and choose your car. Ended up with a SUV for a drive to Houston. Just lovely… was charged a toll «convenience fee» the fee was $ 12 while the toll was 1.75…their response, «Well had you gone through without a pass they would have charged you more.» Well had you used your brain you would have known that waiving the fee would increase client retention. Toll authority has always waived their fees minus the toll charge itself and your telling me that I have to pay a quarter of the car rental itself for a tag? Is that worth losing a client who uses rental cars one to two times a month? Ill keep my business with Alamo.

Horrible customer service here. They gave us an upgrade we repeatedly told them that we did not want, and charged us for it (with all these other fees). The agent and his manager said nothing when we asked if we were just being charged the $$$ we had already paid online. Be careful what they tell you to sign because there are most likely a whole bunch of hidden fees that get lost in the paperwork. Better to rent a car with Enterprise, a company that will make sure that their customers are satisfied. Budget Customer Service at headquarters has done absolutely nothing to rectify the situation. Boo.

I made a reservation with advantage but the line was too long. I went to budget to see if they would price match it. They have Very rude employees with attitude. After she told me the price and i didnt want it. I said. Oh ok Thank You. And started walking away. She yelled, «no!?» At me. Rude.

Budget Rent a Car provided me with the worst experience I’ve ever had renting a car. First of all, I reserved an economy car over the phone. Upon arrival, there were in fact no economy cars available. I requested the same promised rate for a bigger car. They declined and forced an up-​charge taking my total from $ 88 to $ 113 without so much as a sorry. The car I ended up in smelled strongly of cigarette smoke. I tried driving with the windows down and adding air freshener to no avail. The smell was too strong. My next step was to go to another Budget location to exchange the car. That went fine. Upon returning the car, the office closed 15 minutes before their posted closing time, so I never really checked out with anyone. Also, I was unfortunate to have lost a pair of glasses in the returned car and had an entirely different horrible experience. They sales rep on the phone refused to do anything for me until I found my rental agreement number, then left me hanging by saying if they found anything they would contact me.
Just one of these poor service experiences would have deterred me from this company, but this many in a row prompted my first official Unilocal complaint. Please, if you enjoy ease and great customer service stay far far away from Budget Rental. They will case you much unneeded frustration.

Horrible bait and switch. Reserve a car, get there and wait 30 min in line to discover only have cars that cost 100 more. Do not ever use budget unless you are desperate. A complete rip off…

This was the worst car rental experience in my life.

I don’t generally rent cars on my business travels, but I received a discount on this trip because of my Southwest Airlines frequent traveller status, so I took the plunge. Big mistake.
Now I know how these businesses work… I rent the car, I book it early, I have some hidden fees, whatever.
I was quoted a $ 387 fee for a car rental with my «discount» when I booked the rental. I arrived in Austin to get the car and my request for a vehicle with GPS was barely honored. In fact, the douchebag counter clerk spent roughly half an hour attempting to «upgrade» me to a ridiculously overpriced BMW with built in GPS that I didn’t want or need… He was totally pulling the «hard sell» routine that mediocre sales people use and I had to start doing the old, «I don’t think I need that» routine for a while until I had to resort to the flat «NO» to every question deal that you need to do to sales people who are overly pushy.
This salesperson lied, and lied, and lied… Told me that my AAA insurance that I have wouldn’t work for the car rental even though it does, and then made me pay another $ 15 a day for my added driver even though my insurance applies to her too.
At this point I’m thinking, «just get me as far away from this dick before I lose it.»
Finally I think he got that I wasn’t going to be suckered any more and gets me to this economy car that according to him doesn’t have power windows or air conditioning… Oops! He lied again… We have both of those.
We hook up the GPS device and is sort of functions enough to get us to our destination… It works once. After an entire day of this GPS device not working anymore because it was probably created in 1998, and yet still used by Budget for stupid people, possibly in an attempt for future «upgrades», we Jerry-​rig one of our cell phones to do GPS for the rest of the trip…
Thank you wonders of modern technology, and thank you Budget for having a charging hub in the car for our cell phones…
The preliminary cost of the $ 387 price had ballooned to over $ 500 and we are only day 1.5 through our business trip…
I will never again rent a car through Budget and plan to fully contest these added fees, especially in lieu of the failed GPS device.
I guess I should have had a bit of a clue when on our way to pick up the crappy Mazda at Budget, there was a long line of car renters at the Dollar Rent-​a-​car line…
And for the record, after we left the counter, the other Budget employees were really nice…

Initially renting our car from this location was easy, however upon our return they tried hit us with with a bunch of hidden fees. A lady that works there named Elizabeth was absolutely no help at all and was trying to charge us $ 150 dollars more than what was agreed upon. We had to call corporate to have our issues resolved which they did very nicely and told us that the charges they were trying to give us were all completely false. I would rent from budget again but not from this location.

i have never had qualms with budget rentals in my hometown of Phoenix or anywhere else since I have had great customer service. Anyways, I ‘d like to give my kudos to the Budget Rental customer rep who assisted me with my rental at Austin International, Alicia. Alicia was so helpful and answered my questions regarding Austin, I felt very welcomed after a somewhat long trip from Phoenix with a stopover in ELP. so anywho, with her good service, kind words, and great personality she started my Austin stay right, and I enjoyed my trip overall. I do appreciate her giving me a run through of the return process, this was again appreciated. Overall, never had a problem with my rental and the car given to me ran fine. =)

Budget Rent-​A-​Car was located right by baggage claim at the airport in Texas. Very convenient and easy to find. Check in was easy. The girl at the counter tried to upsell us to a newer SUV with only 5 miles on it, but we didn’t really need it.
We booked our car rental for $ 16/​day through
. The cheapest we had found on any other website was $ 30/​day. This was for an economy car. However, upon arriving here, the car we received was a Hyundai SUV. **yay!**
To pick up the car, we had to go upstairs and across the bridge, to all the car rental lots. The process was quick, from start to finish being under 5 minutes.
The car was clean and well kept with no smells.
Cheap, clean, big car… I’m definitely a fan! :)

They bait and switch you and have «we don’t care» service. They spring a bogus charge on you («cost recovery fee» of $ 3.00) once you arrive. They also charge for mileage from mile one and don’t tell you over the phone about it. I spoke with an Amber and a Scott at E 41^st Public Storage location

After years of corporate discounts and Preferred customer standing, I was nervous to be out on my own renting a car. I figured I would be paying an arm and a leg and standing in line forever. However, Budget rental car made the whole process a snap. I reserved the car online, joined Fastbreak, received a price $ 10.00 less than my old corporate rate, and had my car waiting for me as promised for my Fastbreak. It was clean, filled with gas, and ready to roll. I will be renting from Budget for now on.
Tip: With the gas prices being so high, once you get into the mid range cars, the prices go up with car size in very small increments. So if you want a gas pig, you can get one for not much more than a Pontiac G6.