I rented a car, through Priceline, at the Budget Rent-A-Car at the Philadelphia Airport over Thanksgiving. I was renting the car for 3 days and 9 hours and paid for the full 4 days rental as expected. I had the good fortune of my flight coming in almost an hour early and it landed just before 11pm when it was schedule for 11:45pm.

I had specified the pick-up time for the rental to be 12:30am but we got to the rental counter at 11:30pm. The twits at Budget told me that I had to sit there and wait for another hour until my rental start time of 12:30am came up on the clock or I had to pay an additional full day rental of $60+taxes.

There were about 50 cars available in the lot and nobody else waiting to rent a car. Of course Budget has no 24hr customer service and both the manager on duty and the lackey behind the counter refused to do anything about it.

Then when 12:30 rolled around and I finally got the rental, they had the audacity to try to pre-populate the damage waiver and fuel option on the paperwork in an effort to get me to pay more. In summary, I rented a car for 15 hours less than the 4 days I paid for but was made to wait in the rental lobby for an hour, late at night, to wait for the pick-up time to pop up on their clocks.

I forgot to tell you that they tried to upgrade me to a Cadillac and I thought it was a gesture for my troubles then the counter twerp told me it would be another $20 per day. I really got steamed and my wife convinced me to walk outside before I totally freaked out. This was one of the most incredibly bad customer service experiences I’ve ever had.

The whole scenario was patently ridiculous and I will never again rent from such a backwards company with moronic policies and such abysmal customer service. Corporate responded with a patronizing and ignorant 2 line explanation of policy.

They totally blew me off. I am sending a certified letter to their CEO with the hope that it sparks a response. Budget, you absolutely stink.

Budget rented us a lemon. The car broke down after 5 days due to a mechanical defect. The front wheel came off at the ball-joint. Fortunately, we were going slow in downtown Durango so nobody was hurt. My family and I could have been killed had this happened on a freeway or mountain pass. Budget delayed sending a tow truck to pick up the car. We had to wait 4.5 hrs for the tow truck to arrive. We were not offered a replacement car. Budget is now charging us close to $7000 in damages, loss and fees. The car already had mismatched tires and was not properly licensed. It only had a dealer demonstration permit for the state of New Mexico, but it was rented to us in Colorado.

I rented a car recently from Budget at the Minneapolis, MN airport. when I returned the car I accidentally left a $80 jacket on the back seat. When I got to the airport I realized I had left my jacket. I immediately called the Budget desk at the Minneapolis airport. This was 30 minutes after turning in my rental car.

I told the man at the desk that I had left my coat on the back seat and would pay to have it shipped to my home. He got my rental agreement number and said he would search for the coat and call me. I never heard back. A couple weeks later I sent an email to Budget via their web site and explained my situation. It took them a couple weeks to reply. They said they haven't found my coat and if they do they will contact me. My complaint is that a Budget employee had to find my coat when they cleaned out the car and they should have turned it in and then I could have gotten my coat back. Also, if the man I talked to at the desk was trained with any customer service savy he could have made contact with the people who checked in my rental car and found out where my coat was. I wonder if Budget really has a lost and found department or if they just have a lost and never found department.