I had to rent a car because my own vehicle was struck by another driver and needed to be in the shop for some time. The other driver's insurance accepted "full liability" on the collisin, because it was his fault hands-down (he ran a red-light in an intersection that had a video camera on it to catch peopl ewho ran red lights and the camera caught it), and set up an account for me at Enterprise to rent a car at a rate of about $29.00/day. I was ok with this (even though my own vehicle was really a much better car), and rented a sedan from Enterprise. After signing their conttract, as I was about leave when the Enterprise rep asked (outside in the parking lot), "Do you want full-coverage n your insurance". I was lin "done and leaving" mode so I didn't think too deeply about it - ie I *ready* had full coverage on my own insurance and would not need supplemental insurance. So, when someone asks me "do you want full-coverage", then I think, "well of course". So I initialled here, here and here— there were charges which I did see where I initialled, but since the insurance had set up an account for me, and accepted full liability, I thought the charges I initialled for would be covered by the insurance.
Now, I am stuck with the "full-coverage" charge insurance that I did not even need. This situation made me feel totally dumb (for initially the cntract without really thinking about what it meant, though in my defense, the writing on the contract is NOT CLEAR and there was no wording that clearly detailed that my own insurance's "full-coverage" would also still be in effect and that their was "supplemental". Bottom line is that there is no reason why I should pay for something that I did not want to purchase and had no reason to purchase in the first place and Enterprise's incomplete information on their "contract" makes the question "do you want full-coverage?" rather deceptive.
Do I have a case? There is a similar case involving Enterprise charging people for unnecessary liability insurance in NY - it was a class action suit that Enterprise lost in article below (truncated for brevity - full article on http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news03/enterprise.html). It's the same scam, but now Enterprise is doing it with "full-coverage" instead of liability-only.
Enterprise Rent-A-Car to Refund Millions
July 21
Enterprise Rent-A-Car will pay $2 million in restitution to tens of thousands of consumers who purchased unnecessary liability insurance.
Enterprise consented to a court order resolving three years of litigation in a lawsuit bought by New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer.
"This litigation resulted in a significant change in the practices of this rental car company that benefits consumers, " Spitzer said. "The court order compensates consumers who were deceived into purchasing liability insurance through Enterprise even after the states highest court held that rental car companies are required by law to provide coverage for their renters."
In addition to not providing insurance, Enterprise profited from the sale of supplemental insurance.By telling its customers that it provided no insurance, according to the lawsuit, Enterprise induced consumers into purchasing liability insurance, known as Supplemental Liability Protection, or SLP, at an extra cost of $6.95 to $7.95 per day of rental. The supplemental liability insurance provides consumers with $1 million in coverage.
In fact, most customers are covered by their own auto insurance policies and do not need the supplemental coverage.
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