We’ve all read article after article about what airlines and hotels say they’ve been doing to maintain cleanliness. However car rental companies have also changed their protocols to keep things as clean as possible.
Founded in 2013, DiscoverCars.com is an international car rental website that provides rental car reservations. In mid-June, they surveyed nearly 400 of their partner companies around the world to see what they were doing in response to the COVID pandemic, in order to keep their customers safe.
Here’s what they found out:
- 84% of the car rental companies said they were doing special and/or enhanced sanitation on each of their cars across all locations to protect the wellbeing of their customers.
- 27% of them offering additional COVID-19 protection for free. These include hand sanitizer (60%), masks (46%), wipes (17%) and gloves (10%)
- 12% said they provide (similar) items for COVID protection, but at an additional cost.
Depending on the country and its requirements, some companies are also requesting that, before they rent their car, customers sign a form stating they don’t have symptoms of the 2019 Novel Coronavirus, and haven’t been in close contact with anyone who does. In some countries, renters must show a doctor’s note that says the don’t have COVID. Along with that, if a customer does report symptoms when they return the car, many car rental companies are placing their vehicles in quarantine for a period of time until they can be sanitized and safely rented out again.
DiscoverCars.com reports that COVID-19 protection is currently the third-most-popular request from customers in its booking system (4 percent), behind only automatic transmission (10 percent) and tying with air conditioning (4 percent). The website also mentions that online check-ins and contactless handovers are becoming more popular with rental car customers.
Frankly, I’m not super impressed with some of those statistics. I mean, it’s great if 84% say they’ve changed how they sanitize their cars, but what about the other 16%? (shudder)
But that’s just a survey. Here’s what the major rental car companies in the U.S. say they’re doing:
- Enterprise (also owns Alamo & National)
- Avis (also owns Budget & Payless)
- Hertz (also owns Dollar & Thrifty)
- Silvercar
- Sixt
- Advantage (Note: link goes to a .pdf file)
- Fox
Stay safe, travel friends!
#stayhealthy #staysafe #washyourhands #wearamask
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This post first appeared on Your Mileage May Vary
