National Car Rental Free Rental Day Extension
One by one we have seen travel companies step up to the plate to take care of their customers. By extending elite status, pausing the expiration of points, extending free night certificates and other customer friendly moves, the travel industry has done its best (in most cases) to help the customers it serves.
When it comes to car rentals I have found very few companies to be as customer friendly as National Car Rental. I find their Emerald Club program to be superior to other loyalty programs and I have been very loyal to them over the past few years whenever it made sense price wise.
ONE TWO FREE Is Good – Not Extending Certs Is Bad
One way National has added a lot of value the past few years is through their ONE TWO FREE promotion. The promotion allows you to earn points for various tasks while also giving you enough points for one free rental day for every two rentals. When you add up the benefits I get from my matched Executive Club status plus the free nights, I come out ahead even if the price is sometimes a little higher.
No matter my love for National though, the company is doing wrong by their customers. Let me start be praising them for being the first rental car company to announce a one year extension of elite status along with rollover benefits. Normal free rental days earned through the program also don’t expire until December 31, so there isn’t a huge issue there.
Dear National – Extend ONE TWO FREE Certificates
But what about those ONE TWO FREE free rental certificates? Those certificates which were earned between August, 2019 and February, 2020 all expire on June 15, 2020. For example, I earned a certificate on February 26, 2020, a time when Coronavirus was beginning to have a huge effect on travel. I essentially never had a chance to redeem it.
Admittedly I have been distracted and I put dealing with National Car Rental on hold during my time here at home. That is until earlier when a reader Devin commented asking for someone to cover this problem. So, I emailed National Car Rental to ask if they had plans to extend these free night certs. Here is the answer.
Dear Mr. Coomer,
Thank you for being a valued Emerald Club Member. My name is Pagan and it will be my pleasure to assist you today.At this time, there is not a plan to extend the expiration date on promotional coupons, however we will be evaluating the situation on an ongoing basis and the potential for extensions is possible in the future.
Have a fantastic rest of your day!
Kind Regards,
Pagan
National is ABSOLUTELY making the wrong move here. I get that these certs had a fixed expiration date and thus they don’t want to extend them for a year, but they could meet their customers in the middle and extend them at least a few months. Most of us have now been unable to travel for at least 2 months and admittedly most won’t be traveling for at least another month if not much longer.
National Car Rental Free Rental Day Extension – Bottom Line
National Car Rental has been known for their very good Emerald Club loyalty program and for treating their customers well. Hopefully they don’t sour what is normally one of the best rental car promotions by being shortsighted. Extend these certs National and do right by your customers. Why is it even a question?
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I’m in the same boat. I am executive elite & have 9 that I am not able to use. I really hope they extend them till the end of the year. They really should understand with the stay at home orders still in place its crazy that they don’t. Hopefully we will hear something soon about them being extended.
Same issue! Seriously National, making the wrong moves in times when they should be customer friendly!
Can we all send complaints or what is the best way to handle?
I also have three certificates that were scheduled to be used in April, but now I have no use for them by June 15th. I have reached out to them via Twitter, and they are unwilling to grant an extension. I think at least giving people through the end of 2020 would be reasonable. They will lose a lot more in loyalty than they will give up by not budging with their most frequent customers.
I had the same issue with them so thanks for addressing this. While I certainly feel sorry for the industries affected but they really are making a mistake here as you mentioned. Like you, many times even when they are more expensive, I rent with National because of their GREAT Customer service. I’m an Executive Elite with them and almost always use them as I find their customer service great but I’d guess they will change their tune on this fiasco. A time when none of us are even allowed to really travel.
I am in the same boat. My 3 certificates will expire. I have gone on Twitter and reached out and each time they respond by saying no plans to extend. Since we went in a government mandated pandemic stay at home order- am wondering from a legal standpoint if National wants to push this issue. Like you said- you earned the certificate literally right before the stay at home. It was unreasonable that you could use them.
And basically extending the certificates will give them tax$. So they will make at least a little bit on them. Whereas not extending it will cost them mean as a customer. A lot of times they are more expensive; but, perks like this kept me as a customer. Sorry- unless they choose a better business decision then I can only assume that their mission statement as a company is based on questionable practices. And I won’t rent a single car with them again. The saddest part of this is that Enterprise – they extended their free days.