What Happens If You Don’t Return a Rental Car? (Consequences)

Probably, you’re thinking of ways to get around a rental car, avoid bills, or extend your rental period, without letting the car rental know.

Or maybe, you had a problem that has made you keep a rental car with you for too long, of which the company hasn’t contacted you yet. Do you think this could be a way to maneuver such a company?

Or better still, what happens in a situation where you fail to return the rental car, and what are the consequences?

What happens if you don’t return a rental car?

This question is a bit broad and would need to be divided into two levels to be properly understood.

This includes;

1. If it’s within 24 hours:
2. If you keep the rental car for too long

If it’s within 24 hours:

The majority of car rental companies would only keep on charging you a late return fee if you’ve only failed to return the rental car between a minimum of 24 hours and a maximum of 7 days.

Car rental companies have policies guiding the return system of their cars.

For most companies, you’d be charged an early or late return fee for returning a car behind the schedule.

Alongside, there are other fees associated with renting a car, which we talked about in some previous articles, which includes Thrifty and Dollar hidden charges.

It’s worth mentioning that this would only happen for a couple of days, a maximum of 7 days, for many car rental companies.

Of course, car rental companies are after the money.

However, this doesn’t mean they would joke around when their customers fail to return their properties.

As a matter of fact, you could be criminally charged for failing to return a rental car, after a long period has passed.

If the cars stay above 24 hours:

Normally, a car rental company would keep on charging you late fees If you don’t return a car as scheduled. However, if it gets too long, you could be charged with a felony.

Well, this is where the drama begins.

Most car rental companies would keep on charging you if they had their way.

If, however, in the process, it gets to a point where the contract is now overdue and the payment method refuses to support charges from the car rental company.

Depending on how long it has been, the rental car would be reported stolen.

Read on to find out more about that.

What happens If you keep the rental car a week plus:

In detail, there are basically three things that could occur when a rental car is kept for too long above its rental period. Below they are:

You’ll be charged for late fee for one week straight

As we said earlier, most car rental companies would keep on charging you to infinity if they had their way. This includes the late return fee.

However, this can’t be possible, due to several reasons.

One of which is, a stage, where consistent debit charges won’t go through, from a source (in this case, the car rental company).

Read Also: If you fail to pay Enterprise, what happens?

On the other hand, for some companies, you’ll only get to pass through the late fee grace period for 1 week, after which they’ll try to contact you.

You get contacted after a maximum of 1 week

After a week, the car rental company would send a certified letter to make it known to you that you’ve not returned their car.

On some occasions, you’ll receive a call from their loss prevention team.

It’s important you respond within this timeframe because if not, you stand a chance to be arrested.

You’ll be charged with a felony

After a period of 2-5 days of contacting you, if you fail to respond or return the car, the rental company would assume you’re a potential thief.

As a matter of fact, the rental car you rented would be reported stolen.

This would most likely result in a felony that could land you in prison for months.

Note that a stolen car felony could reach the stage of Class 3 felony.

Here’s a detail guide to that.

It’s worth mentioning that all this would depend on the rental location, country of residence, and the exact offense.

What can you do about this?

If you have a rental car with you, always try to keep up with the rental period. This is because most car rental companies have a strong policy guiding their return system.

Better still, you should extend your rental period before it expires, to avoid paying any additional fees as a result of a late return.

To do this, call the phone number of the agent in the rental location you rented the car from and they should help you.

If however, you don’t have their number, you could try contacting the generic customer care number of such a company.

Below is a table of car rental companies and their contact-us phone numbers.

But what If it has already been long, since you haven’t returned the car?

If they’ve already contacted you, hastily respond to their message and make plans of returning the car back to them.

You’ll also still need to do the same, if they haven’t messaged you at all.

Remember. The earlier, the better!

Final Thoughts

If you’re wondering whether you could be jailed for failing to return, Yes, you can. To avoid this, it’s best you keep to time when renting cars or extend when possible.