Avis, Budget To Offer Some Customers E-ZPass Access

Cendant car rental brands Avis and Budget next month will begin offering customers electronic toll technology in the New York and Houston areas, easing both the toll-paying process and expense reporting for business travelers. For a daily fee, customers in April will be able to rent vehicles equipped with the E-ZPass technology, which electronically pays highway tolls from Virginia to Maine, and the PlatePass technology, which accesses the lanes throughout Texas. Cendant Car Rental Group, the parent company for both brands, plans to make it even more widespread by year-end, including service in Florida, Illinois and more spots in the Northeast and Texas. Budget had offered the technology for the past 18 months from Newark Liberty International Airport as a pilot program.

"With information we received from our customers, as well as the demand for the service at Budget in Newark, we quickly learned just how popular this service would be with our customers," Scott Deaver, the executive vice president of marketing for Cendant Car Rental Group, said in a statement. "Electronic toll collection provides our customers with a great time-saving device that will make their travels smoother and more stress-free."

During those 18 months, cars with the toll transponders were rented from Newark more than 25,000 times, according to Cendant. Despite the high demand for the devices, Chuck Fallon, the company's executive vice president of revenue generation, said he anticipated no supply problem to meet demand. They will be available on more than 20,000 vehicles in the Northeast when the program is introduced next month, and by year-end more than two-thirds of the fleet should be capable of supporting them, he said.

Business travelers often find themselves forced into the slowest possible toll lanes without such technology, Fallon said. They usually have thrown their change into their briefcases to speed up the trip through airport security, so they have no choice but to go through the manned line—also their only option to get a receipt.

"It really kind of hits the sweet spot for our travelers in the Northeast. You're in the worst possible position when you land," Fallon said. "This has multiple benefits: speed, efficiency and expense reporting."

The fee for the technology—$1.50 per day in New York and $2 per day in Houston—is charged upfront as part of the rental cost. The tolls themselves are charged later and itemized on whatever credit card the customer provided for the service, so there's no need to collect and save the receipts from the toll stations when it comes time to report the expenses.

The service could be a money-saver for corporations, Fallon said. Business travelers often run through tolls when they're in a hurry and then write off the resulting fine, which the rental car company passes on to the customer, as a business expense.

"They used the rationale that they were going to be late for a meeting to expense it," he said.

Cendant entered into agreements with the Highway Toll Administration in the Northeast and American Traffic Solutions in Texas to offer the technology.

Hertz has reported that it is testing toll devices for its fleet, but the company has not made a formal announcement about a program.