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Turo Requires a Driver's License Number and Credit Card to Show Full Price

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: Turo Requires a Driver's License Number and Credit Card to Show Full Price

#131

Post by mattnewton »

pnutjam wrote: post #64
mattnewton wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Car wash flow is slightly different right? Because it is a cash heavy business - in that case the "laundering" happens through cooking the books to make the business seem more successful (with more cash inflows) than it actually has. That cash comes from some illicit activity with different parties than the car wash and slowly supplements the main income from running the legitimate business. In the turo example, unle…

"Your customer" might just be you.

To do that I would need to get the money into the banking system though right? At which point it has to be already laundered. Otherwise auditors will notice unexplained large cash influxes. I don't think you can rent a turo car in cash.

Re: Turo Requires a Driver's License Number and Credit Card to Show Full Price

#132

Post by jjoonathan »

gnicholas wrote: post #29
jjoonathan wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Engaging at any level with the idea that the fee is for any purpose other than lying about price in advertisements is giving it too much credit.

You're right. I was thinking about Airbnb, which has cleaning fees that can be pretty hefty on one-night rentals. And those are understandable because someone needs to come in and change the sheets/towels, wash dishes, etc. But there's no "bedsheets" analog for a car rental. Yes, it needs to be washed, but I imagine most renters of Priuses don't actually care if the car hasn't been washed in a few days/weeks.

> those are understandable because someone needs to

Nope. The rest of this sentence doesn't even matter: if someone needs to do something, that's a reason to charge for it, but not a reason to hide the price.

Re: Turo Requires a Driver's License Number and Credit Card to Show Full Price

#133

Post by JAlexoid »

sandworm101 wrote: post #98
systemvoltage wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is one area America needs to legislate which I am usually against. There is no excuse but sleezy marketing to not show what something costs. I'd go far even to make sure every price sticker is regulated and should include final sales price . That means, all taxes, all tips, everything. There is only one problem I see – sales taxes are state dependent so it puts a lot of burden on ecommerce/online stores to 1) De…

>> Tips should be made illegal That's about as dystopian as possible. Telling people that they cannot just hand money to other people might be the end of the entire concept of charity.

But tips aren't charity. They're even classified as income in tax codes.

Let alone - tips are very often not "optional"

Tips are literally a variable price co-pay for a service.

Re: Turo Requires a Driver's License Number and Credit Card to Show Full Price

#134

Post by FireBeyond »

nickpinkston wrote: post #127
jayrot wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not all that unique, it's just that "daily car rentals" are pretty amorphous. Similar to how the car wash was the go-to money launder on Breaking Bad. If you have some other eComm platform telling T-shirts or whatever, sure there could be fake orders but it wouldn't be all that hard to track down that these THINGS were never sent/made. But anything involving a service...well, it's much harder to prove that those…

Yea, that's interesting re: audit trail of rental. They technically have the person take a picture of the odometer before/after, but I'm unsure they force. I'm a big Turo user (love renting sports cars off there for weekend corner carving), but I forget if it's required.

Right, but if it's your car (the dealer) you're presumably still using it, so you can easily give the "renter" multiple odometer pictures.

Re: Turo Requires a Driver's License Number and Credit Card to Show Full Price

#135

Post by JAlexoid »

mbrodersen wrote: post #128
sandworm101 wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Tips should be made illegal That's about as dystopian as possible. Telling people that they cannot just hand money to other people might be the end of the entire concept of charity.

Most of Europe operate just fine without tips.

Let's be fair - most of Europe a tip is really optional. No one is depending on tips as the source of their income.

Re: Turo Requires a Driver's License Number and Credit Card to Show Full Price

#136

Post by sixothree »

megafauna wrote: post #2

Last week I went through the tedium of providing all of the requisite information when trying to book a 2014 Toyota Prius for 1 day @ $50.40 through Turo. On the final step of the reservation flow, Turo revealed an additional $50.40 service fee. Seeing the total price double didn't sit well. I promptly exited the reservation flow and deleted my account. I agree with your sentiment - if the app shared the service fee…

The thing that bothers me the most is that the price of the rental is literally just the sum of the fees. And they are intentionally hiding parts of the cost. It's not just a dark pattern, it's an outright lie.
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