Ah, Problems of Prosperity. How I love to talk about Problems of Prosperity. I don't talk about it to very many people, of course, and honestly I usually write about it because it's so fucking embarrassing to say: "My goddamn Ferrari's in the shop again" or "The service in First Class was just deplorable." At the start of this wondrous journey having enough money to pay my rent wasn't always assured.
Anyway, on my most recent trip I prepaid for a rental car. The plane was late so the rental company informed us that if the reservation isn't made directly with them then they cancel it, so they canceled it. They did have cars, but not the one I had reserved, although they had many cars exactly like the one I had reserved. So I decided, logically, to rent one of these identical but unreserved cars. I wondered about an upgrade and was given a price somewhat higher than the standard car I had originally reserved. Being a man who lives deeply in his own mind - said mind befogged by a long flight and jet lag - I had forgotten about the prepaid business. What I was being shown, apparently, was the cost of the upgrade. I did not realize this. No where on the invoice was the prepaid amount listed, logged, revealed, or tallied or I would have politely declined the upgrade.
Halfway through the trip we called to reserve the car for an additional month. The invoice that was emailed to me was almost exactly twice the amount of the original invoice, which made sense to me as I believed it to be the cost for the entire two month period on a reconfigured invoice. Stupidly, I did not look at the dates on the invoice which would have revealed the shocking truth of the matter; namely, that I should have driven the car immediately back to the airport and gotten something much, much cheaper because the amount I was staring at, stupidly, was only for the last month.
I called the rental company and they replied, more or less, by saying: "Fuck off." So I called my credit card company to dispute the charge and they took somewhat longer in their reply which boiled down was a somewhat more elegant way of saying: "Fuck off."
So who's at fault here? I feel like I was hustled by a cagey gate agent. Maybe, maybe not. The fact of the matter is that I was very casual about a money transaction and learned a lesson. Frankly, because the two invoices pretty clearly showed I was shit out of luck I decided to dispute the charge just to fuck with the rental car company on the off chance I was hustled. You know - make them do some work for their extra money. They because I was pretty annoyed at all the fuck offs so I spitefully asked the credit card agent to transfer me to whoever could cancel my credit card but in my defense I did hang up before the transfer went through. The card gives me 5% cash back for all travel-related expenses instead of the 3% from my second best card. If it was 1% more I would have let my spite run wild but that 2% can add up to some not inconsequential money so I'ma let it ride.
Ferraris in the shop, indeed. Read the goddamn invoice, son. Learned a lesson. Renewed my gratitude at being blessed with a nice financial backstop. Give it up.
Europcar 17 - Seaweed 3.
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