Dear Help Squad,
I ran into a problem that I never did resolve. In March I rented a car from Avis in Lake Zurich for a trip to Florida, and paid for it with my credit card. A few months later when I got my statement, I found an additional charge from Avis for $17. I called the associated phone number and was told it was for a toll (of .25 cents) from Florida, which they claim I had not paid. The balance of $16.75 was for a service charge for Avis paying the toll on my behalf! In any case, they did agree to refund me $12.80 without too much trouble. However, even though I am out only $4.20 it is the principal of the thing. When I asked Avis to send me proof that I had incurred a toll charge in Florida, they refused. This, in my opinion, is theft. Avis claimed that this charge was fully revealed in the rental agreement I signed. I have all the paperwork, and nowhere was this revealed in anything I signed.
This is an easy way for Avis to increase revenues, since I suspect most people would not notice this charge, and most of those who did would not complain since it was only $17.
Peter, Lake Zurich
Peter sent Help Squad all of his Avis rental documents and other correspondence relative to the $17 toll dispute. After reading everything, Help Squad did some research and contacted Avis directly. What we learned is that Avis offers an electronic toll payment system called e-Toll, which is marketed as an “innovative, time-saving amenity” that enables renters to “eliminate the need to carry change or wait in long cash payment lines at toll booths and simply zip through electronic toll payment lanes.”
This means that many Avis cars are equipped with toll transponders (which need to be turned on), and all Avis cars are registered for video license plate recognition (which does not need to be turned on). Basically, once you’ve flipped the transponder switch or driven through a video toll lane, you have enrolled in Avis e-Toll.
Per Avis’s website and term #22 in Avis’s Rental Terms and Conditions (the rental jacket provided at pick-up), “If you use e-Toll, you will be charged a $3.95 convenience fee for each day of the rental, including any days on which e-Toll is not used, up to a maximum of $16.75 per rental month, plus incurred tolls at the cash rate. Toll charges will be billed separately to the same credit card used for the rental. You can avoid the convenience fee and any other charges by paying the toll in cash, using your own electronic toll device, or avoiding any cashless toll road or passage.”
Avis Senior CS Solutions Consultant, C. Crawley, elaborated: “The state of Florida has many, many toll roads and also has several toll roads that do not allow the driver to pay cash; they are non-manned toll roads.” On such roads, unless you have your own compatible toll transponder, you have no choice but to use e-Toll and incur the associated “convenience fees” because you can’t pay cash even if you want to. And this is likely what happened to Peter.
From all of the above, following are Help Squad’s three key Avis e-Toll take-aways: 1). Once you’ve activated e-Toll via a single toll payment, you’re in it for the long haul at $3.95 per day, up to $16.75/month, whether you use it again or not. 2). Unlike using a standard toll transponder, e-Toll does not provide a discount off the cash price. 3). The only way an Avis renter can ensure non-enrollment in e-Toll is to: a). carefully map out routes that include no toll roads, or b). provide one’s own compatible toll transponder, or c). travel toll roads that have a cash collection option.
Knowing all of this, it seems likely that more that a few renters (such as Peter) will find themselves inadvertently charged Avis e-Toll “convenience fees.”
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