Gripes
On the topic of things I’m not happy with, two more:
I had two gigabytes of photos from a wedding this past weekend disappear after my usually reliable Hitachi Microdrive corrupted all but a single image. After taking 2GB of photos (which were preview-able on my D200), Aperture failed to recognize any but a single RAW file. Sadly, putting the Microdrive back in the camera resulted in the camera not being able to recognize the files, either.
Also, what the hell is wrong with rental car companies?! Last week, in the span of 48 hours, I had two reservations for compact cars (the smallest class of cars). In both instances I was instead given enormous cars. At Avis at Regan National airport in Washington, DC, I was given a Lincoln Towncar, while at Hertz at Logan airport in Boston, MA, I was given a Jeep Liberty. I feel that these rental agencies need to start using some other word than “reservation” to describe what’s going on, since the car I’m reserving is clearly never actually reserved for me. Bah.
Comments
I’ve been offered upgrades before, but these times were definitely not upgrades. They simply didn’t have anything smaller than what they gave me. Mostly, I’m just annoyed that they allow you to choose a car during the “reservation”, but that information usually has no connection with what you’ll actually end up renting.
Posted by: kasei on August 16th, 2007 1:23 PM
the rental companies usually think they’re giving you an “upgrade”. sometimes they actually are out of all of the small cars, but more often i’ve found that if i insist on getting as small of a car as possible they’re able to magically find that they do indeed have one.
but yeah, the whole idea of car rental reservations is ridiculous since there’s no way they can actually guarantee your reservation. they don’t take any personal info when you make the reservation (and hence you can make and break as many reservations as you want). they also don’t enforce the return date. so you’re typically free to keep the car for longer as long as you pay the daily rate for those extra days.
Posted by: gary on August 16th, 2007 12:39 PM