Hertz AI Scanner Goes Full Big Brother, Customer Outrage is Real AF…

If you thought renting a car was already a soul-draining exercise in corporate gaslighting, Hertz just cranked the dial to 11. The rental king is now letting ts new AI-powered UVeye scanners hunt for “damage” with all the subtlety of a TSA agent on steroids… where the only thing getting violated is your checking account.

(Source: Giphy) 

In short, a former Hertz customer, we’ll call him Steve (not his real name, presumably because he’s in witness protection from Hertz’s legal team) dropped off a VW at Atlanta’s Thrifty. Within minutes, he got an invoice for $440… $250 for a one-inch wheel scuff, $125 for “processing,” $65 for “administration.” Oh, and just for fun, they offered him a $52 “discount” if he paid within two days and $3 dollars off if he paid within a week.  

(Source: New York Post) 

Of course, Steve disputed it only to then be faced with a “choose your own adventure” with a web portal and a customer service bot that would’ve made me bleed out of my ears. Translation: This takes stiffing your own customers to a whole new level, and it’s precisely why customers are a full-on rage bonfire with this. In fact, one user got nailed for $195 for a “ding” they couldn’t find with a magnifying glass, while Hertz responded with this gem: “We stand by the AI.” LOL what?!. Apparently, Skynet is officially running the rental counter at your local dealer these days. 

(Source: News Break) 

Of course, Hertz claims this is about “precision, speed, and transparency.” But the fairness of it is lackluster. This is about weaponizing automation to squeeze every last dollar from anyone unlucky enough to rent a car at the Atlanta airport. What’s more is that Hertz claims they’ll have 100+ of these scanners in US airports by year’s end. Combine that with BigBear.ai’s biometric face scanning and suddenly, every airport in America is now the real life Minority Report. 

As for my opinion on the matter? If you’ve ever rented a car from one of these companies, you know how manipulative they are. And this is no different. These are the same people who billed EV renters for gas, charged one guy $10,000 for “unlimited miles,” and got sued for having customers arrested for “stealing” cars they’d already returned. Now they’ve just outsourced the grift to a machine with zero empathy and a hard-on for rim rash. 

(Source: Giphy) 

But hey, I guess it doesn’t matter when your stock is up +83.11% YTD because of it. Meaning, the only ones actually satisfied and pumping this up are investors… But what’s going to happen when every Tom, Dick, or Harry in America would rather eat glass than rent a car from these slime balls? I’ll wait. 

In the end, if you’re renting from Hertz, you’d better document the car like you’re prepping evidence for a murder trial. And yet, this is just another scenario where AI is actually becoming the hall monitor’s we never asked for. Of course, we’ll see how the consumer backlash will impact Hertz over the long run (shares are down -3% on the day), but for now, keep your eyes on this story… and for any other corporate uses of AI that screams “1984”. Until next time, friends… 

At the time of publishing, Stocks.News does not hold positions in companies mentioned in the article.