U-Haul Truck Rentals Consumer Reviews

ALABAMA -- Well, I made and paid for a reservation for a 10ft truck for 4 hours. I was then told that there would not be any trucks available at that location until the next day. So I called around and located a representative in a nearby town that stayed that she was driving several trucks back from Florida, but she would meet me after hrs when she returned. For that, I'm thankful.

However, her desk was in chaos with misplaced keys and papers from Uhaul and her other business. When she finally found my reservation, it had errors, such as a bigger truck for 16 hours. I still was able to rent the 10ft truck, but was charged another $85 on site. I was told to just return the truck after we finished or before 9 am, because she was closing, that the $85 was a hold and I would not be charged the full amount, if I did not overuse the hours/mileage.

We returned it before 9 am. The next day I realized when my account was overdrawn and the check I paid my home deposit and rent with was returned because there were two charges from Uhaul for $291 and $205. We were not prepared for fraudulent, bogus charges.

When I spoke to Uhaul, I was told that we used 140 miles. We stayed in the local area, and used 51 miles. I was told that they could file a dispute that will take 3-5 days or more. Meanwhile, my account is now overdrawn and I cannot even afford to get groceries because of this error that they seem to only want to make excuses for. Now, I am worrying myself sick over this, literally. I suffer from migraines, due to a benign mass. My BP is up, as well as the migraine.

ESSEX, MARYLAND -- Scheduled a 9am pickup for a 15 ft truck for an out-of-state move. When I arrived, there was ONE Uhaul truck with the flattest tire I have ever seen (possibly slashed?). Called customer service on 4 different phones & spent an hour trying to get it sorted out. Their only advice: they can provide a replacement within 24 hours. Never mind that there are multiple Uhaul locations within 10 miles. For some reason we weren't offered an immediate replacement truck from one of those locations. I had hired paid movers and had to drive 8 hours to my new location and had already taken half a day off of work for this move.

In the end, I went down the street to Penske. They had dozens of trucks available and were able to get us a truck in 15 minutes. The next day when I contacted Uhaul regarding my experience, I was hung up on three times by customer services representatives out of the corporate office. One of them, who identified herself as Katrina out of the executive office in Phoenix, was so incompetent she wasn't even able to locate my contract. Her colleague was able to locate it immediately, so obviously Katrina was not competent to perform her job.

Finally someone offered me a $50 reservation guarantee credit, which doesn't even begin to rectify the 2 hours delay, extreme emotional distress suffered, and pitiful excuse for customer service I've experienced by virtually everyone I've spoken with from the company.

In addition, one of the customer service representatives, who hung up on me, offered me a replacement truck... three days after the date of the contract... for an out-of-state move. Absolute incompetence. I will NEVER use Uhaul again. Penske was $400 more expensive, and worth every penny. DO NOT MAKE THE SAME MISTAKE I DID!!! Definitely contract with a competitor over Uhaul. Unless, of course, you have hours to waste waiting for someone with an ounce of competence to assist you in customer service.

EGG HARBOR TOWNSHIP, NEW JERSEY -- I will never rent another you haul truck again. I had a rental truck for a couple days at the end of May. After my contract was final the total cost was $406. Uhaul took over 700 dollars out of my account without my permission. I don't drive so my only mode of transportation is the city bus and I live outside of the city. Knowing I had money in my account, my wife and I took the bus to the city with the cash we had, thinking we could withdrawal more at the ATM in the city.

When we get to the ATM it says that we have no money and I call to find out that Uhaul had overdrafted my account. Also the main reason we went to the city was to turn my phone on so I now have to call on a phone at a gas station. We realize that they aren't going to help us that day so we have no choice but to walk for over 2 hours back to our house to try and solve the problem. After being disconnected and hung up on several times, we are able to get someone to put MY money owed to me back on the card.

They tell me this is going to take another 4-5 days to be accepted by the bank after taking 3 days to have Uhaul solve the initial problem. I tell the lady of my immediate need for the money and she questions me, only to tell me she feels sorry and can't help. For the 7 days it took to resolve their negligence, my family is living without any food or money. I also have 2 dogs that are unable to eat.

On top of this my rent is past due and I face eviction. My wife pulled muscles in her leg on the walk back from walking so far and we have to pay our bank overdraft fees. The customer service was horrible and everybody seemed to tell us something different. Worse experience of my life and I will never use another rental from them again. GO PENSKE!!

HOUSTON, TEXAS -- I surely do hope this letter and statement reaches the attention of people who can change the way you do business...because your company is no longer about customer service. A month ago I had made a reservation for a truck, knowing full well Memorial weekend was going to be a busy one, but confident a month planning was plenty of time. About a week to go I decide to email and make sure my reservation was still on for Sat., May 29 and was told yes.

On Friday though, when I was supposed to get a call before 5, I decided to call myself and had learned the following: U-Haul overbooks all trucks, reservations online do not reserve anything and the so called area managers are nothing more than a glorified operator. I was told I might not have a truck because of the busy weekend and yada, yada, yada...which is why I booked a month ago. I decided to talk to a supervisor and let her know that I was flying into Houston a few hours later and needed to know fairly quickly if I was not going to get a truck.

She guaranteed me a truck sometime Sat., but was not sure what time and would call me back...of course no call back and I had to go catch my flight. Saturday morning arises and I was told I would get a call before 9 am. Of course no call again, so I call and get told the same thing..."sir, this is a busy weekend and we cannot get everyone who booked a truck in one, so if you wait by the phone we will call you by 5".

Being as patient as possible, I wait and actually call a few U-Haul places in town and learned a few things from 6 different U-Haul employees: U-Haul employees know that everything is overbooked, they all know the internet reservation system is false and they are not pleased with the way things are handled. 5:30 rolls around and I finally get a call, but am told there are no trucks and have to wait until Sunday.

Well, half the weekend is gone and I am stuck in Houston with no truck and getting irate with your so-called area managers. I am told that they are working on getting people who reserved a truck a year ago and cannot handle people like me who reserved a month ago. I am not that stupid, no one in their right mind could know they are moving out and need a truck a year in advance...maybe one or two. So I decide to call Penske....who helped me out of a jam and got me a truck...a company who knows what is available and were easy and pleasant to work with.

What really got under my skin was we passed a U-Haul place heading out of town and saw at least 25 trucks sitting in the lot. Well Sunday rolls around and I get a call from U-Haul about 11:00 am telling me they might have something later in the afternoon...and I said to cancel because I already had other means and was on my way to San Antonio. Supposedly it was noted, but then get another call from U-Haul around 5:30 on Sunday and this time, am told that there are no trucks available and have to wait until Monday.

Apparently your company's system of reservations is not a good one and there are numerous folks, including U-Haul employees that agree. Not only do I plan on never using another U-Haul truck, but am telling everyone I know about the ordeal, as well as sending out letters like this one to all those who will listen. I thank you for your time in reading this.

HOUSTON, TEXAS -- 2 weeks ago 1/20/2004, I personally went to the company-owned/operated U-HAUL to reserve a truck for an upcoming in-town move. I made the reservation for pickup 1/30/2004 5:00 pm and return due date no later than 1/31/2004 5:00 pm. The location that I went to make the reservation/pickup was at: U-HAUL Co. of I-45, 16405 I-45 NORTH, HOUSTON, TX 77090 - (281) 440-5113

I have the reservation contract ‘RENTAL CONTRACT ADDENDUM’ with me and I was billed $100 on my credit card for reservation deposit (this was for 26-ft. truck, moving pads and dolly). I have a witness who was present with me and can vouch the reservation. Now on the day of 1/30/2004, I got at the store at 4:50 pm to pick up the rental and once they looked up my reservation, I was informed I had to return the truck prior to 7:00 am next morning.

The person who had taken the reservation informed me that they had a new manager that had just started after my reservation had been made. And that he had made this change so the truck that I had reserved is supposed to be in prior to 7:00 am and out for next reservation, and then back by 3:00 pm for the next reservation. I was not informed of this change and no reason was given to me as to why this change was made. And of course the manager was NOT available to comment.

I informed that my reservation is until 5:00 pm next day, not 7:00 am. I cannot move middle of the night, plus I informed the desk employees that I had made arrangement for some friends to help me move and they are coming at 7:00 am, 1/31/2004, not at middle of the night.

So at around 5:25 pm finally I get the truck and the following morning I get a call from the manager, telling that the truck should have been back at 7:00 am and that he was going to charge my credit card $100. I and few of my friends worked really hard to get the work done early, because we felt sorry for the other renters. So finally I returned the truck at 11:35am 1/31/2004, and the manager had charged $10,000 on my credit card. He gave a credit of $9,725.52 (after taking $100 late fee).

I have a witness from all 3 occurrences: reservation, pick-up, return. Not only that the manager tried to snatch my original reservation contract from my hand, he was very rude and abrasive. When I tried to take down his name he immediately took off his name tag, I was only able to get his first name: **.

Also the truck given to me had bare metal on the clutch and break, the shift stick groves was all worn out, very difficult to shift the gears. Basically the truck was a road hazard to the public. I was shocked and astonished that such a vehicle would be allowed to operate on the road. This has been a nightmare move in part because of the location I rented the truck from. I am still recovering from that move. I was hoping by renting from the company owned location, this would be smooth uneventful move.

CALIFORNIA -- After reading pages of online complaints almost exactly like mine, I realize that I am not alone. I reserved a moving truck, 2 dozen furniture pads, appliance dolly and utility dolly online about 2 weeks before my required move date which was 8/12/05. I expected a reservation to mean something but found out that it does not at U-Haul. This was probably the worst customer service experience that I have ever been involved in.

My preferred location was about 2 miles from my current house but when I received the call the night before, my truck was at a location over 20 miles from my house. I asked the man who called about the dollies and furniture pads that I had reserved and he told me that he would not have the utility dolly and the other items were first come first serve. Since this was unacceptable for my situation, I called the regional office in Hawthorne, on my first call attempt, I was on hold for about 20 minutes before the phone system hung up on me.

On the second call attempt I spoke with a woman named ** who told me she was the manager and refused to give me her employee number and was extremely rude from the start. I tried several times explaining to her that I had to have the dolly that I had reserved and needed to pick up the truck at a closer location, and yes I realize that it is a "preferred" location and not a guarantee of the location but let's try to make it just a little convenient for the paying customers!! U-Haul overbooking their trucks and not having them available should not be customer's problem.

I checked online and from my zip code of 90245, the pickup location that I was given was # 91 on the list, which I assume means that there are 90 other U-Haul locations within the same radius from my house. She told me that there were no trucks available at any of the other 90 closer locations and there was nothing she could do, she then put me on hold.

Several minutes later a man named ** picked up the phone and informed me that he was also the manager and that he was going to make this conversation very short. He told me that he was taking me off of the truck that I had and was putting me on a waiting list for another truck closer to me, this all being before he even asked me what my problem was or heard anything from me.

I asked him if that meant he was canceling my reservation and he said no, but that I no longer had that "guaranteed" truck. I explained to him my situation and he told me that I was getting "huffy" with ** and himself and he demanded a yes or no answer if I wanted that truck or not. He didn't even take the time to talk to me to find out that my biggest problem was not getting the moving dollies and I could deal with the distance of the truck if need be. He told me he would call me back in a little while.

In the three hours I waited for his call back, I called Penske to inquire about a truck, for 10 dollars more than the U-Haul "reservation" that I made weeks ago. The very friendly Penske Customer service agent made me a guaranteed reservation including all of the equipment that I requested. She called the pickup location to verify that they had the equipment that I required and it was done...all in about 10 minutes, less that the time that I spent on hold waiting for U-Haul's very unprofessional "Customer Service" department. The next call I made was to U-Haul to cancel my reservation which was the only part of this ordeal that went smoothly.

ROSEVILLE, CALIFORNIA -- 117 Wills Rd, Roseville, CA 95678: I will not be back to this facility. I usually like Uhaul. This time, truck broke down. The Significant Problem is the disinterest or refusal of the General Manager to discuss the bill with me. You cannot reach the facility directly by phone; always have to leave message with the call service. I am told he is the only one who can discuss the bill. G M was left 2 messages on May 14 by the call service, and 1 on May 17, May 22, and May 24. Each time I was told he would call within 24 hours. NEVER a call. So the only person I can speak with about the service will not contact me, the move cost extra because we had to rent another truck to complete the move, because of the breakdown the move took 2 days rather than 1, I have spent multiple hours on hold on the phone, and 2 weeks later I cannot get a resolution to the bill. At this point I wish to warn others that if there is a problem with the move you may well be in trouble.

WINNIE, TEXAS -- A month before the move, arranged movers, rented truck. We got a BIG discount for doing it online. A week before the move, they called to offer us a larger truck, same money. Good, right? We call the night before to reassure ourselves that the truck will be there. Well, they said "oh, nobody called you?". The truck was in Oklahoma and would not be there until 4 pm, then 8 pm, then the next day. 4 hours later on the phone, we were told they could not help us get a truck in another neighboring city. We called the next city over and got Tyrell on the phone. He found us a truck on someone else's lot, took our credit card info and put us on hold and there we sat for another hour.

Called location #3, got another person on the phone and we got a truck for $1600.00. Our original truck was $700. Kept the movers waiting for 12 hours, and somehow we were charged for the first truck, and our credit card information (which was used for Tyrell) got used in Houston in five places. We could track it back to that transaction. This whole situation has been a nightmare.

LAS VEGAS -- DO NOT RENT WITH THIS COMPANY or be prepared for additional charges tacked onto your account after the return. I recently rented a vehicle from U-Haul and returned it according to schedule. Charge should have been $19.99 x2 days... I look at my credit card statement and sure enough, U-Haul has charged me $196!!! No explanation, just a huge charge. I called and spoke with the RUDEST Asst Manager you'll ever find, who told me I'd damaged a fuel door on a vehicle.

I pressed the issue of how absurd that was then she told me the door was completely missing!!! WTH? She said in the rudest voice, "I'll play the footage to tell you what was there when you pulled off the lot"... I told her how ignorant that sounded, knowing the setup of that place, there is no camera where the van was parked, nor where I parked when I got back to the facility to return it. She then asks, "Look do you want me to view the footage or not"... WOW!!!

Needless to stay, they stuck with their guns and I simply called my bank to dispute the erroneous charge. My bank stated, "Oh, we get a lot of disputes for this company". Hmmmm!!! Guys, there is a reason that the rates are so cheap, they are certainly making money in other ways. Be careful, and find another avenue. This place is a huge fraud!

SE 92ND ,PORTLAND, OREGON -- I have to say that I'm not complaining of U-Haul in general. This is for specific location in SE 92nd in Portland Oregon. When I went to pick up the truck the guy that was in the front desk didn't say hello or anything, he left then come back ask me some questions, he gave me the paper on how to turn in the truck. And hand me the key, he told me that the truck was park across the street, didn't even bother to say thanks or anything. I found the truck. It was very hard to take it out from where was park. I drove the truck then I have to come back because the back was open and we couldn't close it.

Also I order a appliance dolly, which wasn't in the truck. When I came back I ask for the dolly. He didn't said anything. After all this I notices that I got charged twice. I send email to the company and someone Name Willie respond. He said he will take care the problem. After that he never respond my emails and never got my money back.