41–50 of 82 posts
Facebook only logins... why not OpenID?
That may make me a luddite, a terrorist, or even a social-scrooge, but you'd think it would be worthwhile to make a minor concession to your potential customer base and allow people to create accounts without having to go through (and link them to) Facebook.
When considering only commodity vehicles (a Honda Accord or whatever), the motivation of most urban renters is likely a low friction way to go to Costco on a Saturday, etc. without the cost/bother of owning a vehicle. However, the motivation for someone to pay more to rent, say, a BMW for the afternoon is quite different and probably not one which would give the BMW's owner warm fuzzies. It seems that Getaround might…
Zipcar seems to be fairly successful despite leaving the key in the car.
Who covers the cost (often quite high) of fixing/cleaning dings, dents, rips, missing/broken parts, broken headrests, dog hair, dirt (from plants?), gum, and other such things?
These are car maintenance issues I see all the time when using both Zipcar and CityCarShare. If I had a personal car, I'd flip if it was subjected to the level of abuse that these fleet cars are -- the depreciation due to wear and tear would be significant.
[Edit] Since I got downvoted to 0 (and have no idea why), I'll expand on the relevant answers I found in the FAQ:
What if my car is returned dirty?
Renters are required to be responsible and keep
the car as clean as possible. At the end of every
rental, you can rate the user and leave feedback.
If they return it in a dirty condition, you should
note this when leaving feedback.
... actually, that's the only FAQ item I can find on the subject. The cars are insured, but what's the deductible? Who pays it? Is the insurance company really going to pay out a claim for a broken headrest, a ripped seat, or a ruined floor mat?
When considering only commodity vehicles (a Honda Accord or whatever), the motivation of most urban renters is likely a low friction way to go to Costco on a Saturday, etc. without the cost/bother of owning a vehicle. However, the motivation for someone to pay more to rent, say, a BMW for the afternoon is quite different and probably not one which would give the BMW's owner warm fuzzies. It seems that Getaround might…
Zipcar seems to be fairly successful despite leaving the key in the car.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Zipcar seems to be fairly successful despite leaving the key in the car.
Interesting as I did not know the key was left in the vehicle. Does the strong branding of the car help them out because it reduces the potential resale value? I perceive most stolen cars are "parted out", so this shouldn't matter much though.
"The National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB) reports that 2009 marked the nation's sixth consecutive year of declining vehicle thefts in the United States. U.S. motor vehicle thefts declined 17.1 percent from 2008 to 2009—the largest annual decline in decades."
http://www.rmiia.org/auto/auto_theft/statistics.asp
Also "premium" cars from zipcar have pretty discreet branding - just some on the rear bumper, nothing on the doors.
The thing that makes Streetcar for me though is the customer service. I've gone to car drop places and it's not been there (parked on another street due to some idiot parking in the carshare spot), had problems in-car with the stereo (and in one case, working out how to put the damn thing in reverse!), and the CS reps have always been super helpful and proactive about helping me (and in the case with the moved car, gave me an extra half hour of rental time).
I guess you would have the actual owner on hand to help you with that sort of thing, but it's not quite the 24hr support and detailed knowledge about the cars I would get from the streetcar people.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Zipcar seems to be fairly successful despite leaving the key in the car.
"Malloy adds that Zipcar's proprietary security systems are installed throughout its fleet to prevent car theft." http://directmag.com/mag/marketing_zipcar_goes_extra/
Also (and perhaps I shouldn't say this) I often see additional zipcards in the trunks of zipcars - by the spare tire - presumably for use by service personnel.
Who covers maintenance? Who covers the cost (often quite high) of fixing/cleaning dings, dents, rips, missing/broken parts, broken headrests, dog hair, dirt (from plants?), gum, and other such things? These are car maintenance issues I see all the time when using both Zipcar and CityCarShare. If I had a personal car, I'd flip if it was subjected to the level of abuse that these fleet cars are -- the depreciation due…
As you point out from the faq, the onus seems to be on the owner and the only consequence for the dirtiness is the ability to rate the user. I think a more serious question relates to the adjudication process in the case of more serious violations such as scratches, damage or theft of items from the car. Do they automatically take the word of the owner - and what happens in the case of false claims against a renter by an owner - what appeal process does the renter have in that case?
Eric Sink suggested pretty much this exact idea some years ago, but said he didn't think it would work because of the risk of people treating cars badly. http://www.ericsink.com/Choose_Your_Competition.html I tend to agree; I'd not be at all keen to loan my car to some random stranger. I'm more attached to it than the average person, but there just seem to be too many things that could go wrong; what if they smoke in…
Every rental car I've ever had has had at least some of these faults. None are what I would be prepared to live with in one of my own cars.
But I'm probably atypical. I would never own a holiday apartment for rental either.
However, if it was structured right, you could get to the point where people purchase a car specifically for the intent of hiring it out for profit, in the same way that people do with yachts, holiday apartments and other high-value durables. Although I think you'd be better off with a private 'fleet' of several cars to spread the risk across several units of any one car being off the road at a time. I could see myself purchasing a vehicle specifically for rental. Maybe an insurance write-off that can be repaired and works OK but has very low market value because of the title history. Maybe a car that has an out-of-fashion color or cosmetic damage like hail damage that won't matter to the renting person, but makes the car pretty much worthless in the marketplace. I can think of 10's of strategies of purchasing a vehicle at below-market value and then putting it into a rental pool. If I didn't purchase the vehicle as a personal possession, but merely as an investment item, I think my attitude towards it would be different.
I wonder how easy it would be for someone to sign up with fake id, pass the screening process and then steal a really nice car. Or, worse, remove some of its engine parts and replace them with cheaper ones. Do I need to tag each part in the car and strip it down each time it's returned to make sure no one has swapped anything out? (Some internal parts are expensive enough that it might be worth someone's time to rent…
These are all legitimate issues you bring up, but they're all issues that normal car rental companies face too. How do they handle it?