Enterprise Rent-A-Car, owned by Enterprise Holdings, is a car rental service that provides users with a large selection of vehicles, a straightforward and easy-to-use online rental system, a myriad of features and advanced customer service. Because of its excellence in these areas and its superior quality, we have chosen it as our TopTenREVIEWS Gold Award winner for online rental services.
The first thing that will be apparent to most users when they first click on the Enterprise rental site is how simple it is. There aren't any flashing ads, Google ads or obnoxious sales pitches. The site is fantastically simple and no-nonsense.
The home page presents the car rental reservation tool, up-front and center, not hidden behind sales pitches. It's almost as if they know that people coming to their site want to rent a car and get done with it as quickly as possible. This fairly common sense concept isn't as common as one may think.
Another seemingly common sense concept that isn't so common on other car rental services such as Dollar and Ace Rent A Car is the use of different languages. Since Enterprise has rental locations in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Ireland and Germany, they took steps to help users of various languages. The site provides a simple fix in the form of a dropdown menu. Simply choose French, Spanish or Dutch and the site is translated into that language.
If you need to know the nearest rental location to your home and place of business, the Locations page is going to work wonders for you and is easy to navigate, because, once again, the site designers used a layout that makes sense. Users click on the country of their choice and then type in their city, state, airport code, province, post code or zip code and the site generates a list of all the rental locations for that area. The site also lists the rental location's address, phone number, business hours and a tool to check the rental rates at that particular location.
Regrettably, the common sense love fest has to end somewhere. The only feature the site lacks is a search tool. So, if you can't find the feature you’re looking for, the only real solution is to contact customer service. This seems to be an unnecessary hassle for the customer and the customer service representatives when adding such a simple tool would be an easy fix.
No matter if you are looking for a large van, pick-up, moving truck, luxury car, hybrid or just a basic rental, Enterprise has what you are looking for. In fact, they cannot be matched in selection of rentals by any other site on the web.
The most unique rental that Enterprise Rent-A-Car offers is moving and commercial use trucks. These trucks can be rented by the day, week or month and feature late-model vehicles. Don't have that much to haul? You can rent a cargo van instead of a truck.
A close runner up to the scarcity of rental trucks is rental pick-ups. Most rental car services do not offer pick-ups as a rental option. Enterprise offers smaller pickups such as Chevy Colorado, Dodge Dakotas and larger pick-ups such as the Chevy Silverado and Ford F150. Larger pick-ups feature a V8 engine and advanced driver and passenger airbags.
The site also gives renters the choice of picking up and dropping off the car in different locations. This is a great feature for people who are moving or who are driving from the airport to their home town. This feature is called one-way rentals.
If you need your rental for an extended period of time, that's no problem. You can either join their One Month or More Rental Plan, or you can simply book your car for months at a time. The One Month or More Rental Plan saves you money by taking $25 off the second month, $50 off the third month and $75 off the fourth month's rental price. All additional months are also $75 off. The plan is a great alternative to leasing a car because you can cancel at any time without a penalty. Renters with this plan will also have for the ability to have an extra driver at no additional charge, no charge for vehicle exchanges and 24-hour roadside assistance.
Though Enterprise Rent A Car doesn't have as many features as Hertz, it has enough features to satisfy most users.
One of the site's best features is its commitment to environmental causes. Besides offering a wide range of hybrid cars, you can also offset your emissions. When completing your reservation users are given the option to add a Greenhouse Gas Emissions Offset Charge to your package. This option costs $1.25 which goes to TerraPass to finance certified offset projects that are focused on removing carbon from the atmosphere. Enterprise matches these contributions dollar-for-dollar up to $1 million dollars.
Another green feature is the carpool assistance program called Rideshare. No other car rental service offers a program like this. Users can find already formed vanpools or create one of their own. Van pools consist of 7 to 15 co-workers that pay a monthly fee for an Enterprise van. Since the groups use one vehicle instead of several, less gas is used and fewer emissions are released into the air.
Businesses or individuals in need of a more permanent vehicle solution can find help on Enterprise's site, as well. Customers can browse cars that are available to purchase in their area. The vehicles are divided into groups by special deals, Earth-friendliness or fuel efficiency.
For individuals that need navigational help, you can add GPS navigational systems to your rental reservation for an added fee. You can also rent toddler seats. This provides safety for the child at their destination without the need to transport a safety seat on an airplane or lug one from your personal vehicle to the rental. The site doesn't list what size child is accommodated by these seats, so parents or guardians will need to consult customer care for more information.
Though GPS and toddler seats are handy, unfortunately, the site doesn't offer a way to choose discount gas, roadside assistance, insurance packages or toll passes on the site. You have to go to your local rental branch to add those choices to the reservation you made online.
The site also drops the ball when it comes to total on-site reservations. To complete your reservation, you must finish the forms at the rental counter when you pick up your rental. There are no online check-in options.
As mentioned above, Enterprise doesn't offer online roadside assistance or insurance packages online. Though this is a major oversight in their customer service options, the car rental services site does have superior customer service in other areas. For example, the site includes live chat support. This means that if you have a question, you can ask a representative your question in real time and get an answer immediately.
This car rental services site also has listings of customer support call center numbers for various problems and locations and offers email support, as well.
Though the site may lack in a few areas, overall Enterprise Rent-A-Car is one of the best car rental services on the web. It has a superior selection of vehicles, a common sense design and a commitment to Earth conscious products that out-do any other site on the web.
