Large rental car companies continue to rent vehicles that have been recalled. Last year, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration asked domestic car manufacturers to provide recall repair information for car rental companies. It found that 90 days after the recall was announced 65 percent of Enterprise’s car had been repaired. This compared favorably to other car rental companies: 53 percent for Avis/Budget and 34 percent for Hertz. But these numbers fall well short of the NHTSA’s recommendation and common sense: recalled vehicles should be fixed promptly.
This failure has consequences. For example, last year ABC news reported on the death of two sisters who died in an automobile collision caused by a fire under the hood of their rented car. The vehicle had been recalled over a month before the sisters rented it, and in fact, had been rented to three other people after the recall.