A friend of mine was telling me about car hire and scanners which is something I have never experienced or even was aware of their existence. I can understand the need for this if it is policed correctly and you are in control of the process. One has to think using an AI scanner has to have an upside for the car hire company and a downside for those hiring the vehicles. When you consider only 10-15% of customers pay zero excess or full comprehensive. There are 85% of the customers who can help boost the revenue.
Last year when I collected my car hire vehicle I was miraculously upgraded and kind of figured out the reason immediately. I always do the fully comprehensive cover as I do not want to be hit with the $2500 excess bill which is in the fine print if you look close enough. This is why they take a deposit on your credit card for that amount and is not just a security payment, but more of a just in case you crash or damage the vehicle and that covers the excess for the insurance claim.
Out of habit I pay the extra $150 or thereabouts so they do not take this extra security payment. The upgraded vehicle I received had a slight ding on the boot and I assumed because I had paid for the full comprehensive cover that I would be blamed for this and my insurance cover would pay for that repair. Someone was going to pay for this and it is definitely not the car hire company so they were waiting for someone like myself to use the comprehensive insurance cover I paid for.
I am a good driver and normally I would not pay for extras except I do not trust these companies today. I do not trust the other drivers on the road as the driving standards have dropped from what they were. In South Africa you can buy your license which then gives you the right to drive internationally even though you have no clue how to drive and do not know the rules of the road. Over the years I have done my UK test a SA test and the advanced drivers licenses which was a requirement working for a cigarette company due to the high end sports cars we were driving.
About 10 years ago when travelling in France we hired a car and for the first time I paid for the full insurance cover. The vehicle we had was a brand new car and during that week of car hire someone had crashed into the side of the car when it was parked outside the hotel where we were staying. The damage was quite extensive yet still drivable which we did and just handed it back to the car hire office at the airport.
No questions were asked as we had the full cover and it was just a simple it was not me and here are the keys and we left. If we had not had the full comprehensive cover I would have been billed $2500K on the credit card so the $150 sounds cheap when you look at it that way. Ever since that day I have always paid the extras and will continue to do so.
The scanning machine will be used to charge people even for the slightest scratch whether the car hire company gets them repaired or not. This is extra money in their pockets for every scratch or ding they find because they will have a business model where they benefit from repair work besides selling the policy which will have commission paid by the insurance companies. The scanning machine is more of a money maker and people will learn to pay the extra insurance cover because it will work out cheaper.
