U Haul’s policy: The Customer Is Always Wrong U Haul
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This past weekend my housemate and I moved from an apartment in Malden, Massachusetts to a house in Melrose, Massachusetts. The house and apartment were only 1.5 miles apart, so this was a local move.
Several weeks ago, my housemate went to the “Uhaul Center of Malden” which is the local U-Haul rental facility. He made a reservation for a truck for this past Saturday, and he made this reservation in person. He had no problem making the reservation.
I should point out that my housemate is a non-native English speaker, so that may be part of the source of the confusion that I will describe.
This past weekend we both went to the Malden facility to pick up the truck. Since my housemate was the one who made the reservation, he went to the counter and I waited several feet behind him (There were no other customers at the time).
As the lady at the counter (who apparently is the manager of the facility) and my housemate go over the paper-work, she tells my housemate that the truck will be due back at 3PM. However, my housemate had the understanding that we had the truck all day, and that’s what he had been told when he made the reservation. The manager denied this and claimed that she told him verbally when he made the reservation that it would be due back at 3PM. They went back and forth several times on this. I stayed silent since I had not been there when the reservation was made so I had no way of knowing who was right and who was wrong.
After about 1 or 2 minutes of this, the manager raises her voice and threatens my housemate and says something to the effect of “If you continue to argue with me, I won’t rent a truck to you”. At that point, I was absolutely flabbergasted that she had said this. However, I stayed silent since my housemate is more even-tempered than I am, and we were obviously dealing with a hyper-sensitive employee.
They argued for a very short while more. Then, the manager turns to me and says “Could you please explain this to him?”. Of course, this puts me on the spot. I have no way of knowing what was really said when the reservation was made. I know my housemate as a good and honest person. On the other hand, I have this U-haul employee who is strangely quick to anger. So of course, I have to believe my housemate. But, I tried to be non-commtittal and said “Of course, I have to sympathize with him [my housemate]”.
Well, it was obvious the manager was now mad at me because I didn’t back her up. (What was I supposed to do?!!) Then, my housemate lets out this nervous, embarrassed chuckle because this had become an extremely awkward situation. Bizarrely, the manager accuses my housemate of laughing at her! She then says that she will not rent a truck to us because: A) We argued with her, B) My housemate laughed at her, C) I did not back her up when she asked me to “explain it” to my housemate, and D) She didn’t like my attitude. I tell her we’re going to the call the police. She says she doesn’t care.
We step back from the counter, and I ask my housemate for the original receipt that he had been given when he made the reservation. I look at it and it does say “7AM to 3PM”. Although my housemate insists that the manager never verbally told him that the truck was due back by 3PM when he made the reservation (and I believe him), that time was on the original receipt. It was hard to argue with that.
So, we go back to the counter, and my housemate apologizes profusely. The manager doesn’t budge, and still refuses to rent a truck to us. Then, she asks us to leave the building, so we do.
One thing I don’t understand is that she could have pointed to the receipt at the very beginning of the argument, and this whole ugliness could have been avoided. We wouldn’t have been happy, but we really couldn’t argue with what was in black and white.
Even though we made a mistake, it was an honest mistake. Even the most well-meaning people make mistakes. But, this representative was hyper-sensitive and had an utter lack of patience. She was very quick to raise her voice at us and very quick to threaten us over what should have been a minor misunderstanding.
We get back to our car. Since I had never been arbitrarily and unfairly denied service like this before, I did not know what to do. So, I called the police. They were very sympathetic with us, and they agreed that we were treated very poorly, but there wasn’t much they could do. That was about what I expected.
So, we drive back to our apartment. Since it’s a Saturday, I know it’s going to be very difficult to find a truck somewhere else. So, I call the national 1-800 number for U-haul and hoped that they would help us find another nearby pick-up location. They forwarded me to the Boston Regional Office.
The man I spoke with their was incredibly rude and refused to help us. He also refused to allow me to explain what happened. He told us that a U-haul facility manager may deny service to any customer at any time for any reason. He also said that if we were denied service he was “sure it was for a good reason”.
Of course U-haul has such a policy to protect themselves in case someone who is drunk, or has a bad driving record, or has a criminal history, or some other serious problem tries to rent a truck and gets mad when he’s not allowed to. However, this same policy is being used to allow managers to deny service at their arbitrary whim since they can deny service for “any reason”. In other words, there is no accountability for managers in terms of how a customer is treated. Therefore, if there is dispute or misunderstanding between a customer and a manger, U-haul’s policy is simply this: The customer is always wrong.
I called the national 1-800 number a second time. Over my protests, they forwarded me to the Boston regional office again. This time a different person answered the phone. She was very nice, decent, and polite. She helped us find a truck at the Saugus, MA pick-up location. I thanked her profusely and told her that she was doing a really good job. The truck was bigger than what we were comfortable with and it was stick-shift which I can’t drive (but my housemate can). But, we made do with what we had. With this, U-haul partially redeemed itself.
Despite this partial redemption, we’ve still vowed not to use U-haul ever again. Also, we recommend that no one else use it either. But, if you do need to use U-haul, be very polite to their employees. Take whatever they give you. And never, ever dispute them on any point no matter how trivial the issue is.
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