Rental Car Minimum Mileage Scam

This last weekend I flew to my home town of Grand Rapids and rented a car from Budget, because it was the cheapest, at $52 dollars after fees and tax. In order to get the keys, I had to sign an interesting document though. It stated that I had to drive the car at least 75 miles or else I would be faced with an additional $75 dollar charge.

This doesn’t make any sense to me. Why would they want me to drive the car further? This they didn’t tell me about this when I made my reservation, and since they didn’t make it very clear when I was actually getting the car, I’m classifying this as an Awful Scam. It’s only because I read the fine print of what I signed that I knew to drive the car around for awhile before bringing it back.

Awful tip of the day: Don’t use Budget to rent cars.