GM Car Owners With OnStar Now Can Be Their Own Rental Agencies 195
The Los Angeles Times reports that the world of micro-rentals just got a whole lot more crowded, with the introduction of a nationwide partnership between GM and ride-sharing company RelayRides. RelayRides has been arranging short-term car sharing in just a few cities for several years; car owners can sign up to make their own cars available for short-term rentals to others, so their expensive investment (especially in cities where parking is like a second apartment's rent) isn't sitting idle. Now, the two companies are rolling out that system in a much larger market: the rest of the U.S. Owners of GM cars new enough to be equipped with OnStar monitoring systems will be able to sign up to take part with the OnStar system providing the ability to unlock and track those cars remotely, which might make the bargain more attractive to many owners who'd like to earn money from their cars (and reduce the total number of cars needed in a given area), but reluctant to hand the keys to a stranger. (Cars without the system can still be enrolled, but will require a key hand-off.)
Still Evil (Score:3, Funny)
Even though this seems like a good thing, there is a corporation involved so I'm sure there is evil involved.
Gentlemen of Slashdot, affix your tinfoil hats and let's start dissecting this!
Re:Still Evil (Score:4, Interesting)
Even though this seems like a good thing, there is a corporation involved so I'm sure there is evil involved.
Gentlemen of Slashdot, affix your tinfoil hats and let's start dissecting this!
1) Find car you'd like to steal or strip.
2) Social engineer the car to be a part of this "rental agreement".
3) "rent" car using the usual fake ID stuff (or just tell them you're an illegal and they're not allowed to discriminate against you).
4) Drive to steel walled warehouse or just strip the parts you want, after all they have fake ID.
5) Profit!
I am virtually certain GM is not prepared for the security implications of this.
Another interesting topic is I rent the Home Depot truck when I'm transporting garden manure etc. I wonder how they handle borderline situations where its not illegal or wrong, but...
The last topic I've never been able to understand is there used to be intense publicity about civil forfeiture, where you'll lose your car non-judicially just because a cop wants it. Now this could happen to anyone walking down the street, but how do these rental deals handle having the cops steal a car from a renter?
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"2) Social engineer the car to be a part of this "rental agreement"."
Uh-huh, because if you want to strip a car, you're not just going to smash the window and hotwire the car with the little box you bought off of e-bay in under 5 minutes. Riiiight.
Re:Still Evil (Score:5, Funny)
"2) Social engineer the car to be a part of this "rental agreement"."
Uh-huh, because if you want to strip a car, you're not just going to smash the window and hotwire the car with the little box you bought off of e-bay in under 5 minutes. Riiiight.
Of course not. That little box you bought on eBay likely came from some sweatshop in China and, for all you know, contains lead (a product known to the State of California to cause Cancer).
A little social engineering is pure, American made goodness (or maybe Nigerian, but hell, we're all free marketeers here, right?).
Why do you hate America?
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Why do you hate America?
Do you *really* want the full list, or should I just point you to the last half century of American history?
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Joining WW1 on the side of Germany would have been retarded. Britain had naval dominance, so it would be a military failure. Britain also was (and is) a massive trading partner for the US, so it would have screwed up our economy as well.
And, while you may be right in saying if the US hadn't entered the war, WW2 wouldn't have happened, you could also make the case that if there had been an actual conquest of Germany (rather than surrender), WW2 would not have happened. And without the US, that conquest would
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"2) Social engineer the car to be a part of this "rental agreement"."
Uh-huh, because if you want to strip a car, you're not just going to smash the window and hotwire the car with the little box you bought off of e-bay in under 5 minutes. Riiiight.
Seems like a lot of risk to take on in public which you can avoid with just a little paper and social engineering.
This is sounding like why social engineer yourself past the front desk guard when you can just crash a car thru a ground floor window?
Now you could have fun by setting up your enemy as a new renter so as to trash their car.
Re:Still Evil (Score:5, Insightful)
Seems like a lot of trouble. Wouldn't it be much easier to steal the car the old-fashioned way? Presumably your method would result in the organisation having a picture of you (from your fake id), and the monitoring system would reveal the car mysteriously disappearing when entering your steel walled warehouse. So basically the police now know your face and your hideout.
Even if that does not lead to your capture, they can put your picture in a database and the next time you attempt to steal a car you'll get flagged and arrested.
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better to stage a fake accident with the rented ca (Score:2)
better to stage a fake accident with the rented car and have the deep pockets of GM / on star / RelayRide pay out.
Re:Still Evil (Score:4, Insightful)
What I was wondering is in the case of legitimate rental use, I don't think regular car insurance will suffice. I wouldn't be surprised if one of the car owners finds that out the hard way.
All you need to do is rent the car to a guy nicknamed Crash that can't afford to acquire/insure a car for his/her own use...
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And what happens when both companies deny responsibility?
I've dealt with insurance companies before, I doubt it's worth the risk.
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1) Find car you'd like to steal or strip.
Okay you found a generic GM car. Now why is this "GM" car special that you want to steal it?
2) Social engineer the car to be a part of this "rental agreement".
Why bother?, if you want this particular GM car, just steal it. At a minimum, you probably need the get around having vehicle account verification information to social engineer adding the to the rental system, So if you think you do this, just social engineer Onstar unlock the car instead of adding them to this rental company agreement. That's probably easier to do, since if you want to sign-up, they'll probably
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At this point, I don't think there is much difference between this rental and a typical car rental...
However, I could trash the car of the supvr who fired me with this scheme, as opposed to generic Enterprise renta-car model.
Also I've heard in Vegas you can rent a Ferrari, but around here I've only seen the worlds most boring 4-door commuter cars, with the exception of a couple heavy duty trucks (but that's bordering on ripping off uhaul, not enterprise rentacar). Privately owned cars seem much more interesting.
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I sometimes do this--not the Ferraris or Lamborghinis, mind you, but somewhat more modestly priced cars (Audis, BMWs, etc.). Check around for "exotic" rentals. You may not be able to find Ferraris, but you can probably rent more than just you standard econobox.
One interesting thing about these agencies is that they do not provide
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I would assume that if you're doing a car-sharing type of arrangement, the insurance will be an important consideration. Before I let some maniac behind the wheel of my Corvette or Cadillac, I'd want to make sure that his insurance will be buying me a new one if he totals it.
Most p2p car sharing services today have a umbrella insurance policy that superceed personal policies during the rental period (which is paid for out of the rental take). This used to be a murky areay of the law (some insurance policies were void if you rent out your car for money), but for many locales, recent changes in the law that require both that 1) insurance companies to accept personal vehicle sharing program insurance covereage w/o voiding their personal coverage, and 2) the personal vehicle shari
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2) Social engineer the car to be a part of this "rental agreement".
If you can do that, you can probably just find a way to use the on-star system directly to unlock/start the car. If you are able to submit a valid rental agreement, why wouldn't you be able to get a "I lost my keys" request through?
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I am pretty sure there are much easier ways to steal a car... Like say hot wiring it and driving it away.
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Correction: I am not a stupid bigot. I probably shouldn't have spoken for the rest of Slashdot.
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Unfortunately, the statement is more true than not. I've volunteered within a few different social service and public assistant roles over the years. When looking for assistance on things like housing/heating/food, the government forms all state very boldly that a lack of citizenship or legal residency will not necessarily disqualify you. I'm not a bigot, but as a taxpayer it disturbs me to see welfare programs abused to the extent they are... let alone by illegal immigrants.
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While your post may be informative, the implied leap in logic--that because lack of citizenship or legal residency is not an automatic disqualifier, you as a private citizen will be forced to hand over your car keys to someone who is going to steal it--is awful big, and could really only be considered logical by ... a bigot.
Or maybe you weren't saying that at all. Maybe you just wanted to chime in that you find the idea of your tax money going to illegal immigrants disturbing, even though it has no real rel
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No, my reply was in reference to the grandparent's statement, just as yours' seemed to be.
[...] tell them you're an illegal and they're not allowed to discriminate against you.
I wouldn't hand over the keys to my car to any stranger, let alone the majority of my friends and family. Race or legal status would have very little addition bearing on the situation, if any.
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So which is it? Am I fool for handing my car keys over to someone who tells me they're in this country illegally and that I'm not allowed to discriminate against them, or is that claim actually plausible, as your original post more than implied?
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Again, my statement was not in direct relation to the rental of vehicles. Rather it cherry-picked the aforementioned quote to offer a broader sense of what is or isn't just.
That said, I do indeed think you would be a fool to hand your keys over to anyone that you didn't not personally know and trust. Barring that, you would certainly be a fool for providing access to your property (via rental) to someone whom is in this country illegally. They almost assuredly have falsified documentation and would leave yo
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welcome to Straw Man City.
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Not sure the last time GM killed 40,000,000 people like Mao in the Great Leap Forward.
But yeah, fuck evil corporations!
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Well, it was meant to be satire... my zero mod tells me I was completely unsuccessful. I thought the bit about the tin foil hats would show that I was being sarcastic, but alas...
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Drug trafficking is an interesting area... can't the cops confiscate any vehicle used in drug trafficking? Can they take my "rental" car?
Sweet (Score:5, Insightful)
Great news for people who want the shit beat out of their cars by random strangers.
Re:Sweet (Score:5, Insightful)
Piece of advice to people that cant afford their car so they need to rent it out: Find a cheaper car you can afford or switch to a different mode of transportation. If you are even considering renting your car out for extra cash, your car costs too much.
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It's no that they can't afford their cars. Monthly parking can easily run more then a monthly car payment for a luxury vehicle. Even if you got a $500 beater, you'd still be paying $400-800 a month to park it.
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Then move to the suburbs where parking is free (in your own driveway, or in apartment parking lots).
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Free!*
*$1200 monthly mortgage or rental agreement required
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*$1200 monthly mortgage or rental agreement required
And rent in the city is free? You have to live somewhere.
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Then take public transit. Name one city where renting a space for a car costs more than $300/month and they don't have excellent public transit options.
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New York.
(Nope, no excellent public transit options. Halfway decent public transit options in most of Manhattan and a few parts of the other boroughs. Rather poor public transit (as in slow-ass buses) everywhere else.)
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The parts of New York that would have $300/month parking are generally the parts that have good public transit.
You think people are paying $300/month to park on long island?
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Name one city where renting a space for a car costs more than $300/month and they don't have excellent public transit options.
San Francisco. I lived in Bernal Heights and worked at the foot of Potrero Hill. I could drive to the neighborhood I worked in and park in 15-20 minutes, the variance being largely determined by the difficulty of finding parking. I had to spend at least 1h15m (pretty much always longer) taking a bus, the muni, and a bus to get to work on public transport. To do it on foot probably would have taken 30 minutes but I was still pretty damned fat then so I wasn't into it, though I probably should have been.
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Great news for people who want the shit beat out of their cars by random strangers.
Modern cars are so depressingly hard to abuse that this is almost a non-issue. The old gags, like neutral dropping the transmission to do a burnout in an automatic, are a thing of the past thanks to hyper-aware engine computers that know when not to let the operator do things that might hurt the engine. We are almost at a point where a service like OnStar could even put the car into "no speeding mode" and prevent the operator from violating the speed limit at any given moment. About the only thing that c
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The car I rented was pretty beat-up. Only 5000 miles with a scratch on the passenger door, and scratches around the driver door handle. People just don't give a shit about taking care of other people's property. (Which is probably why everyone's so deep debt... constantly replacing the stuff they didn't take care of.)
My first car lasted 360,000 miles and my second car looks like it will live to see 250,000 (it's japanese Mitsubishi so they don't have as much longevity). No scratches at all. Loan out my
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Modern cars are so depressingly hard to abuse that this is almost a non-issue.
I take it you're not around teenagers on a regular basis. No?
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1: Rim Damage (obvious)
2: Engine wont rev AT ALL when the brake is applied
3: You will come to a complete stop way before that happens, see #2
4: Traction control kicks in immediately even if you manage to get the transmission to go into gear above idle RPM
5: Traction control wont turn off
6: Brakes override throttle, see #2 again
You really have no idea how much joy they have managed to suck out of modern cars. But "rental rage" should be a lot better than it was in days gone by.
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that's why i have leather seats in my CR-V. both my kids puked in there and i didn't get to wash the car for weeks until after the fact and the smell came out
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You just got used to the smell. Ask someone who will tell you the truth.
Re:Sweet (Score:5, Informative)
Seriously. I just had a rental with 5,000 miles on it. The thing looked, felt, drove, and smelled like it'd been used to drive angry pigs to and from a slaughterhouse by a lead-footed 9-day-old corpse with IBS. If there's one thing people don't give a fuck about, it's taking care of a rental.
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Someone I once knew always said "Nothing parties like a rental!"
Re:Sweet - Disagree (Score:5, Informative)
I've had a lot of people raise their eyebrow at this. They typically recount a story where they treated their rental like crap. But they've rented many cars. Most are rented at the airport by business people who drive to a hotel and an office, and back to the airport to go home. Most rentals are like that minus the horror stories you hear.
The nice thing about the Hertz program is that you rent the vehicle after finding it online near you. You can rent it for 3 days at $50/day. You get to drive it and see if the tire pressure sucks, or the car shimmies, or the tranny doesn't shift right. You bring it to a garage and have them inspect the car for damage and general road worthiness. If you decide to buy, you go to their website, click "Buy" and keep the car. They send you an fedex with all the paperwork, and even do financing through Chase or BoA. After you send them the downpayment, they send you the completed registration and plates for your state. You can even transfer your old plates if you sell your old car separately. I dumped a 100k+ mileage Honda Accord hybrid on CarMax. They paid me 4k for it, and the AC didn't work and there was significant body damage. We now have a 2011 late model SUV with 37k miles, the AC works, and the car has been like a dream in comparison. Gets the same mileage, and is from a reputable Japanese manufacturer.
For all those who are going to reply that the car will be trouble down the road, I'd ask you to tell me how you treated your last lease vehicle. That is what you're going to get on a used car lot. One driver who didn't change the oil, and didn't give a crap about the car because it was just a lease and they will trade up in 3 years anyway. Is there really any appreciable difference? Yes. The rental company had an incentive to make sure the car was in its rental fleet, and so they did the maintenance regularly. It all depends on your POV... if you want to roll the dice that you got a good lease car over a bad one, okay. Or, you can buy the rental for thousands less, with the chance that a small number of drivers abused the car, while most treated it with care lest they end up having to pay the rental company for damage. I'll take the latter.
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Sure, it's great when you can inspect it before plunking down money. I'm sure there's plenty of fine former fleet cars. But how would you feel about loaning the car out after you've already bought it?
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New cars are for ego driven suckers.
Agreed. (Score:2)
Who among us treats a rental with the same tender care we treat our own cars?
I always check the tire inflation of a rental. I have gotten cars with 60 lbs of pressure. Does this make drifting easier?
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Who among us treats a rental with the same tender care we treat our own cars?
I always check the tire inflation of a rental. I have gotten cars with 60 lbs of pressure. Does this make drifting easier?
Mr. Thompson? Hunter S. Thompson [wikipedia.org]?
You're still with us? Thank God! We thought you were dead!
Oh my, never dirty... (Score:2)
Who was talking about vandalism? Just rode hard and put away wet is all... And we are talking rentals here, Are we not?
"Ouch, podjo, that was a bad pothole."
"No worries. It's a rental vehicle."
A friend's car is of course returned clean and full.
Whoa! Fifty GBP for turning in a dirty car. There would be no charge in the US for returning a car with a bit of litter in it. Maybe if the interior was egregiously filthy, or if you smoked in it. Then you could get dinged. That said, I usually police the in
Don't worry; I'm a rofessional (Score:2)
Save Ferris
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Ruh-roh :(
Open questions... (Score:4, Interesting)
The point is rental companies see their cars as an investment that is supposed to bring in some profit before being phased out. Private owners consider their own cars as "my precious" and renters as "who cares, it's not my car" and hope the rental company doesn't note the new scratches.
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Insurance is included with every rental
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From the Relay rides [relayrides.com] website:
Insurance is included with every rental
Who does it insure? Liability insurance for the carrier/vehicle owner, or actual coverage of damage to the vehicle itself?
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Sure, but who's to say they don't drive it from Chicago to Vegas and leave it there. Who pays for your airline ticket to pick up your car?
If you think rent a car places are bad about dents (Score:4, Insightful)
If you think rent a car places are bad about dents just wait for this.
Better take a video of the car before pick up so you don't pay for old dents.
Why just cars? (Score:3, Interesting)
My closet is full of clothing just hanging there unworn.
And my sock drawer is a virtual gold mine!
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And my sock drawer is a virtual gold mine!
I'm just glad it's not your underwear drawer.
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Just brown rocks there...
As a newly semi-urban dweller, cool (Score:2)
We have two cars, parking for one, and variable (relatively low) needs.
I actually looked into this, but our cars are too high mileage (they limit to 120K and we racked up miles quickly prior to our move) to rent out through their service.
But when one dies, this will probably be better vetted in practice and if it's still going this provides two more options for me depending on frequency of need.
1: More convenient and cheaper rental
2: A way to partially offset the cost of the newer car.
Either way, I like.
Problems for both sides (Score:5, Insightful)
If I'm renting my car out under this arrangement, how can I be sure that the renters aren't abusing it in subtle or hard-to-detect ways? Burning up the brakes, doing donuts in parking lots, weird stuff with the transmission... there are lots of ways to damage a car that won't be immediately apparent. By the time it's noticed, it may be too late. And even in the case of overt damage, expect a major fight with the insurance company over just who caused it and whether your insurance or Relay Rental should pay. Dealing with insurance companies is always a nightmare, every time.
For rental recipients, this poses its own set of problems: how do you avoid being blamed for damage you didn't cause? How can you be sure that the car isn't missing basic functionality – you wouldn't be happy to get a rental in the middle of July with broken A/C.
I can tell my Ford how to restrict itself (Score:3)
while the kids drive. I can set the maximum speeds and even the volume of the radio with Ford's mykey. I would hope OnStar is as advanced if not more.
After all, if the car leaves the proscribed area it should turn itself off.
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The second thing I see in the ad is that insurance is provided by the firm
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If I'm renting my car out under this arrangement, how can I be sure that the renters aren't abusing it in subtle or hard-to-detect ways? Burning up the brakes, doing donuts in parking lots, weird stuff with the transmission...
All of that stuff can be detected with onstar. Burning up the brakes? You can detect whether the brakes are depressed, the vehicle speed, and the throttle position. Donuts in parking lots? If you have electric power steering the computer knows where the wheel is, and it knows the throttle position. Weird stuff with the transmission? I don't know what you're talking about, but the entire transmission state is known by the computer, as well as the throttle position and brake status.
For rental recipients, this poses its own set of problems: how do you avoid being blamed for damage you didn't cause?
If Onstar is being used int
relayrides insurance (Score:5, Informative)
Its worth remembering what happened to a poor boston student who rented her car for a carshare out using relay rides (and their liability insurance (same 1 million dollar liability insurance GM is using):
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/14/your-money/relayrides-accident-raises-questions-on-liabilities-of-car-sharing.html?pagewanted=all [nytimes.com]
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I don't understand this. If I go to Hertz, rent a car, and plow through a playground, I'm liable. Hertz tell you so, repeatedly, when you get the car and they try to sell you insurance. Why should it be any different for an individual? I can see if there's a maintenance or other issue with the car. But if the driver it is on them and their insurance (either through the rental company or their own private insurance) to cover the damages.
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Its worth remembering what happened to a poor boston student who rented her car for a carshare out using relay rides (and their liability insurance (same 1 million dollar liability insurance GM is using):
An unusual case. The person renting her car killed himself and injured others. Since the person was dead, he couldn't tell anyone that there was insurance through the company organising the car rental.
That student is not going to pay the cost of the accident, because quite simply, the accident wasn't her fault, so she has no liability. At worst it may be that her own insurance will pay and her insurance will become more expensive. Where I live, that can happen if your car is hit by an uninsured driver, y
My 0.02 (Score:2)
Here's the first thing I thought of.... (Score:2)
http://www.ag.auburn.edu/users/parmega/articles/neon/ [auburn.edu]
Re:Important reminder (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Important reminder (Score:5, Informative)
RelayRides will take a 40% cut and provide a $1-million insurance policy for the owner and $300,000 for the renter.
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Really? Because on their web page, they say the provide a $1 million liability insurance.
Re:Important reminder (Score:4, Insightful)
You don't sue cars, you sue people. That old woman crossing the street can sue the driver of the car, not you. It is him who has been negligent by running her over, not you. Otherwise it'd be sort of like lending your brother your gun and then being liable for any damage he did with it.
And you can also sue the driver of the car for negligence in damaging your car.
How much you'll get out of him is another question, of course. You might like to check that he is insured before you rent your car to him.
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You're right, driving is the driver's responsibility and that's who should be insured. One question though: If the car is not maintained in a roadworthy way, or has a dangerous fault known to the owner but not something the person renting the car would be able to detect then I would have thought the owner would be liable. I don't mean things that a reasonable inspection of the car would uncover (Like the BOLTSS bikers get told to do: Brakes, Oil, Lights, Tyres, Steering, Suspension), but things that are
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In Florida, the burden of proof is on you to prove that you were not driving your car if you get a red light ticket.
The owner of the motor vehicle involved in the violation is responsible and liable for paying the uniform traffic citation [...] when the driver failed to stop at a traffic signal, unless the owner can establish that [...] The motor vehicle was, at the time of the violation, in the care, custody, or control of another person;
http://www.leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statut [state.fl.us]
Re:Important reminder (Score:4, Insightful)
...unless the owner can establish that [...] The motor vehicle was, at the time of the violation, in the care, custody, or control of another person...
Like having rental details available from RelayRide that says the renter was operating the car?
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Like having rental details available from RelayRide that says the renter was operating the car?
I'm sorry, I wasn't clear. My point was that you can and would get a ticket in the mail, and you would have to prove that someone else was driving. The need to prove that would be a punishment in and of itself. Also, you would be rolling the dice to see if they believe you.
And my other point is that in New York, parking tickets are given to the car, not to the driver. So, the owner would be responsible.
While I'm sure that rental companies have all sorts of loopholes and outs, doing this as a private per
Re:Important reminder (Score:4, Interesting)
I was in a collision scenario around 10 years ago where the driver was definitely not the owner. Someone hit me at a red light; all 3 passengers got out of the car QUICK and bolted from the scene. The passengers all got rounded up in front of the local police department (why, oh why would you run towards the police lol) but they could not easily determine the driver of the vehicle. Neither could I, as I only had an instant to relax before the hit - I saw them coming in the rear view and my immediate concern was for the service manager who was in the passenger seat on a test drive to help solve an intermittent misfire. The car that hit me turned out to be an over due rental - and none of the occupants were the renter of the car; it was one of the passenger's sister who rented the car. Eventually the insurance company covering the rental (turned out to be a dealership across from the location I was getting my car looked at) paid for the damages to the car.
In any case, I would be very leery to rent out my car unless I had additional insurance protection to cover this scenario - and I would have to think that between the extra hike in insurance costs plus GM's cut of this process, it would probably not turn out to be a whole lot of money unless I was renting a few cars at a time.
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Why didn't the police just fingerprint the steering wheel? Running from an accident is a crime.
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That would involve "Actual Police Work (tm)". Can't have that. Why didn't the police fingerprint the stuff that I know the intruder touched when I had a break-in some years ago? Too much trouble.
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Why didn't the police just fingerprint the steering wheel? Running from an accident is a crime.
Or why not arrest all three of them. Isn't running from an accident a crime even if you were not the driver?
Though the most obvious answer is the police just didn't give a shit, which is usually the case for minor crimes for people that don't matter. Do the same thing to a politician's car and they will have the entire force crawling the streets for you.
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Owners of vehicles are, in most jurisdictions, jointly and severally liable for the injuries caused by the negligent operation of their vehicles.
It might be that GM assumes liability for you, but since they provide $1 million of coverage, that implies to me that dollar $1,000,001 comes out of your pocket, not theirs.
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Actually you sue the driver first - then when they are dry you go after the registered owner of the vehicle. I know it sounds stupid but as long as the tags are in your name you are responsible for it.
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You don't sue cars, you sue people. That old woman crossing the street can sue the driver of the car, not you. It is him who has been negligent by running her over, not you. Otherwise it'd be sort of like lending your brother your gun and then being liable for any damage he did with it.
And you can also sue the driver of the car for negligence in damaging your car.
It is true that you sue the driver of the car; however, in some states (e.g. New York) the owner of the car is "vicariously liable" for the negligence of any driver of that car who was driving with the owner's permission. This means that, so long as they can show that the driver was negligent, they do not need to show anything about the owner.
This is the same manner in which, for example, if you're run over by a negligent, red-light-running Pizza Hut delivery guy, Pizza Hut is automatically liable,
no matter
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Re:wear and ill treatment (Score:5, Insightful)
So when my car is rented by someone who slips the clutch like a driver's ed student and puts five years worth of wear on the clutch plates in two days, I'm supposed to be happy about this because hey, Onstar?
No thanks.
You don't have an automatic, unlike 94% of cars sold? That's easy, this program is not for you. I bet they wont even enroll a standard transmission car, it's not worth the hassle of requiring another check box on the web form.
Re: (Score:3)
You don't have an automatic, unlike 94% of cars sold? That's easy, this program is not for you.
Agreed, the grandparent used a bad example, but there are lots of ways that careless/malicious renters could abuse a car with an automatic. They can still drag race, do donuts in a parking lot, and so on.
Will people using this Onstar rental service be allowed to restrict rentals to experienced drivers with good records? Can you specify no one with less than 4 years of driving experience or with more than 1 at-fa
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Being electronic, the operation is easily overridden in software (for example, by the owners request whenever the car is in "rental" mode.)
Re: (Score:2)
I can see using RelayRides for a ratty subcompact car whose only purpose is to be a backup vehicle, or for something to drive downtown that it doesn't matter if it gets hit by car doors, vandalized, broken into, or set on fire. At least the vehicle can perhaps pay for itself.
It would not have much value when selling though. I'm sure Carfax or other places will note the vehicle has been used as a rental, and this will disastrously impact the thing's resale value.
Re: (Score:3)
Good point but that doesn't mean much. Look at the bathroom or break-room at work. We all share that space but there's always 1 or 2 people who just don't give a shit.
They dump feces or urine on the seat for you to sit on. They dump coffee on the counter or take the last cup, and don't brew a fresh batch. They steal other people's drinks or meals. They spill in the microwave or fridge and don't clean it up. The same thing would happen with the shared car as happens with shared bathrooms & breakroo
Re: (Score:2)
Good point but that doesn't mean much. Look at the bathroom or break-room at work. We all share that space but there's always 1 or 2 people who just don't give a shit.
Actually, they do. That's kinda the problem.
Re: (Score:2)
But after the door is already scratched, then it's too late. You can barr the offender but the damage is already done.
Re: (Score:2)
What the fuck is wrong with owning 3 or 4 cars?
It's not like I can drive more then one at a time. 1 4x4 truck (Sierra Nevada, Hunting etc, plus towing home new cars), 1 tail finned 1960, 1 v8 roadster (daily driver), 1 race car (Fiat 850 sport, big turbo bug motor, 12 seconds and dropping).
1158 combined cubic inches.