Automatic damage assessment via AI: Hertz charges high fees for scratches
For weeks, large AI scanners at Hertz check returned vehicles for damage. Now a customer is to pay, but no further investigations are planned.
The autoscanners are from UVeye
(Image: UVeye)
A few months after the US car rental company began using AI technology to automatically scan returned vehicles for damage, there is now a field report. The US magazine The Drive has explained how a customer experienced the system after returning a rental car with a minor scratch. Minutes after Hertz received the rented Volkswagen back, the man received a message via the company's app that he should pay 440 US dollars. He was supposed to pay the majority for the repair, but Hertz demanded around a third for processing the damage detection and a fee.
More transparency promised
Hertz introduced the system in April, the heart of which is a large scanner that can capture an entire vehicle without even having to stop. When a car is rented out and when it is returned, high-resolution images are taken and automatically compared with each other. The aim is to detect damage completely automatically. The car rental company announced at the time that this would make the maintenance process more accurate, more efficient and more closely timed. It would also be able to offer customers a more reliable service, improved availability and greater transparency. However, the affected customer now has doubts about the latter in particular.
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According to The Drive, the sum demanded by Hertz was made up of 250 US dollars for the repair, 125 US dollars processing fee and 65 US dollars administration fee. There was no opportunity to ask questions, but instead an offer was made. If the sum was paid immediately, Hertz offered the customer a discount of 52 US dollars. However, the customer would have to agree to the conditions within two days. If he did so within a week, he would receive a further 32 US dollars discount. Inquiries by e-mail, however, might not be answered until much later. In any case, the customer concerned did not do this because he did not want to simply take responsibility for the damage he had suffered.
According to the report, it is unclear whether the processing fee charged is higher or lower than after discovery by a Hertz employee. The company itself told The Drive that the vast majority of rentals are incident-free. If damage does occur, the stated aim is to “improve the rental experience by bringing more transparency, accuracy, and speed to the process”. Digital vehicle inspections would enable clear documentation and speed up the process. The Group did not comment on the opaque process of calculating costs.
(mho)
