A Curious Statistical Anomaly

Result is: I will never, ever rent a car from Avis again.

First, you need to know that Avis has been our preferred car rental place for years. They have nice clean cars, good service, and they’re efficient and fast at the counter. We’ve been using them whenever we needed to have a car when traveling or when needing something a bit more reliable when heading to a convention within driving distance as our car got older (14+ years at the present time). I’ve always been the second driver if my husband initiates the rental and he’s the second driver when I initiate the rental, and they’ve never blinked at having the spouse as a second driver at no extra charge — usually just show that your license is valid.

Monday, November 21st, 2011, we made an online reservation to pick up a compact car on Tuesday late in the afternoon. As usual no problem with this step.

We arrived at the rental office in Waldorf, MD and waited for our turn. Hubby had turned in the reservation so he was doing the paperwork. There was a pause while they checked on the car and hubby got an emergency call from work so he was handling that when the Avis person came back to the counter. So, I stepped up and answered the questions she still had. Then I said that I would be the second driver and asked if she needed my license. She said sure and I handed it over as she said, “There’s no charge for a spouse if you live at the same address and have the same last name.”

I replied that I lived at the same address but, when I got married, I kept my last name — so it was different from my husband’s.

She then said that would be an additional $13.00 per day for the rental. I asked why and was told because my last name was different. I was flabbergasted. I said that there is no law that requires a woman to change her name when getting married so why were spouses with different last names being singled out for an extra charge. They fell back on the “it’s corporate policy” response.

I asked when that policy went into effect and was told that it had always been that way. I responded that we’d never run into this policy in the 5 to 6 times we’d rented from them in just the last two years. They replied that it should have come up because they’ve always had this policy.

We cancelled the car. Stopped at another rental place up the street and rented a car there. We had to wait a bit because we hadn’t put in a reservation, but we got the car, added me as a second driver — spouse — with no extra charge even with a different last name.

Avis has lost us as customers. We’ll never again do business with a company that discriminates against women who choose not to change their name when they marry. I don’t know if this has really been their policy all along and no one ever enforced it (because they knew it was wrong) or whether it’s new.

If you’ve run into this problem yourself, I’d really like to hear about it. Tell me your story — what happened? Did they lose you as a customer? Or, did you just pay the extra fee?

I’ve waited nearly a week before writing this post, but I’m still ticked off by this blatant discrimination against women. I didn’t change my name when I got married because my husband is secure enough to deal with it (he sort of likes being Mr. wife’s-last-name half the time) and because I had education, professional training, and job experience that would all have to be contacted and asked to note the new name in case a new employer wanted to check me out. There’s enough crap to do in life without dealing with that issue. Most of our married friends have different last names, probably 50 / 50 same and different, so this must be netting Avis a lot of additional money if it’s being enforce that’s why I’m curious if others have had the same problem.