I travelled yesterday to the west coast for a family event this weekend. Yes - I flew - and despite Mister Mix’s previous column, all went smoothly and Mrs. Wypoxic and I survived.
That is until we figuratively met our match at the rental car counter and caught a glimpse into the pit-of-despair that we call late-stage capitalism customer service.
I had rented a car online with Thrifty, which is owned by Hertz. I am both a Hertz Gold member and a Thrifty Blue Cip member.
We landed in a big city airport and the debacle began. First, we (me, spouse and sister-in-law) had to overcome the journey to the rental car center itself. Three escalators, two terminals, Air Train and enough steps to trick my Apple Health app average into thinking I didn’t need to walk again for the next year.
In the process of the online rental, Thrifty promised me that I could skip the line at the counter upon arrival, choose my vehicle online and go straight to the garage to pick up my car. I must have received 10 emails and 5 texts reminding me of this special benefit just for Blue Chip members.
Yet, every time I tried to do just that - choose my vehicle - I received an error message that simply said “Bad Error”. WTF does that even mean? Are there “good” errors?
The end result after our marathon trek to the rental car center (I didn’t even bring my trekking poles - who knew they’d be needed) was the realization that we had to wait in the line at the rental car counter. It was a pretty standard counter with 6 or 7 computer stations. At the prime time we arrived - around 6:30PM - there were exactly 2 agents behind the counter, and already 20ish people in line.
Waiting. Waiting. Waiting. After about 15-20 minutes with literally zero movement (and the people being helped by the counter agents when we arrived in line still being helped by the counter agents while we stood in line), I was already fraying at the edges. Mrs. Wypoxic (who excel at being happy in the moment) counseled patience, knowing me all too well. Fat chance.
So I devised a plan. They would keep our place in line while I went to the Hertz Gold booth in the garage and see if I could expedite things that way. It took me 5 minutes to jog to the Hertz booth where the was literally no one waiting in line. 10 minutes of haggling later, I had accomplished… nothing. Defeated, I jogged back to the Thrifty line.
Eventually, another counter agent came out to help. Three now out of 7 stations. A .430 batting average - Hall of Fame numbers if we were playing baseball. Not so much for renting a car.
On the plus side, we did get to know the people in line around us - a Gov’t Policy professor at Cornell and her three kids, and a couple of businesspeople experiencing the same angst as me.
Suddenly, a 4th agent appeared at the far end of the counter. He sat down at his workstation and typed - for 10 minutes - but never called the next person in line. Eventually, my sister-in-law walked down to see if he was available. He told her he wasn’t ready yet and to wait our turn in line. turns out, he was never “ready” as he eventually took a phone call, chatted for another 5 minutes or so and then got up and… left.
Eventually - 1 hour after getting in line, we made it to the counter. I had prepaid the reservation, so things moved quickly. the agent was actually very nice, and while I told her I knew it wasn’t her fault, the experience was, to say the least, not great. She told me I would be getting an email to review our experience and she wanted me to be honest about how bad things were because the frontline agents had been complaining about the sane long lines that produced irate customers and the burden fell on them. She thought maybe if customers relayed their negative experience, things might change.
Right 🙄
After having missed the Friday night dinner we were supposed to attend, we picked up our car and drove to the hotel.
And of course, as we arrived at the hotel, I received that critical must-have text from Thrifty that my car was ready to be picked up.
Welcome to late-stage capitalism customer service in the greatest country on earth.
