Alaska Auto Rental — Local services in Alaska

I would strongly avoid this car rental agency. They lack good spirit and the fairness of doing business. They have bad policies which selfishly cover their interests, and leave the customers totally exposed to factors beyond anyone's control. Alaska Auto Rental employees are not willing to listen to their customers and understand the customers' problems. Their policies favor only them, and the managers bluntly apply those policies at full prejudice to the customers. Their Fairbanks manager Peter, is very cut throat, hard headed, and lacks empathy.

I booked a rental 5 days before my proposed trip. They demanded that I pay full 100% rental fee upfront for a confirmed booking. And they were very persistent that I do so, otherwise which I might not find an available car. I had little choice. After the telephone booking, I never received any terms and conditions in written or electronic form. nor did I get any receipt either. (Clearly a case of lack of professionalism)

Later there was an event of theft at our hostel in Fairbanks. This occurred a day before my rental as due. I lost my drivers license, cash and my credit card with which I made the booking. I had to cut short my trip to Prudhoe Bay owing to this misfortune. My cancellation request was within 3 days of my booking. Don't think that Alaska Auto Rental would have lost a lot of business in that short time.

Alaska Auto rental refused to refund my money, for an event totally out of my control. The reason for not refunding, was their "no refund policy on cancellation within 3 days of rental". I tried clarifying my position several times and even tried my best to convince them that I wasn't cheating and in fact was in need of any available funds. The theft was even reported to local police and I even submitted necessary proof to Alaska Auto Rental. All my pleas fell on deaf years.

A manager name Peter at the Alaska Auto Rental refused to budge from their "policy". There was no way I would be able to honor the agreement. Neither I had the credit card from which I made the phone booking, nor did I possess my valid drivers license to legally rent the vehicle.

I tried visiting them personally a couple of times, however, Peter was never in office either. None of the other staff members had any authority or say. In the end I even dropped an email to them seeking some partial refund if not full. The email remained unanswered for almost a month.

This business is totally run by unprofessional, immoral and blunt people. Their policies are bad, like some hard writing on the wall, and nothing holds in front of those policies.

You don't want your holiday or work suffer at the hands of some deaf policy application and...

We recently rented a 12 passenger van from Alaska Auto Rental. It was fairly easy renting the van and getting confirmation via email. We did a one-way rental from Fairbanks to Anchorage. The first problem was finding out there was no shuttle from the airport with Alaska Auto Rental so we had to get a taxi. It was a short way so we overlooked that. Then they show us the van to go over the condition of van. The van was very dented and dinged and had two huge dings in the windshield. The back bumper of the van was also covered in paint and/ or epoxy. It was not very nice inside but again we overlooked the inside and outside condition knowing that the roads in Alaska can cause a lot of dings and dents. The next problem was after we unloaded all of the luggage and went to lock the van, the side doors lock was broken. We should have called but again we went with it. When we had luggage in the van and we stopped someone had to stay with the van. In Anchorage the rental gets turned into Alaska Auto Park so no one really looks it over at the time you turn it in. But it didn't take long for a receipt to be emailed. Much to our surprise there was a $500 extra charge for windshield replacement! We immediately called and had to leave a message for a return call. When person called back from Alaska Auto Rental he acted like he had no information from Fairbanks about the condition report that we had gone over when we picked up the van. I'm not sure of his name but he asked me if I had a video to prove the windshield was already damaged! I said no but it was on the paperwork. He said he didn't have access to that and he would have to call Fairbanks. The $500 charge was taken off about an hour later. All and all our experience with Alaska Auto Rental was not totally a good one. We paid a lot of money for a not so great van and then they tried to charged us more money.

Update!! We were recently contacted by management to discuss our complaints and improve the issues we had experienced. We would like to thank Alaska Auto Rental for this quick response and willingness to reach out in order to resolve these issues. For our troubles they gave us a substantial refund and we are very...

I can’t emphasise enough how happy and grateful I was to find Alaska Auto Rentals. I visited in December and Initially I had booked to hire a car with a well known company at the airport - Alamo - (as I’m sure many tourists do) It was only after doing some research I realised that Alamo do not put winter tires on their hire cars, this seemed crazy to me, as many tourists are not used to the conditions. Although Fairbanks does a good job keeping their roads cleared they are still very icy, and if you want to travel further afield the road conditions get worse. I read online that Alaska Auto Rentals were a local company that always put winter tires on their cars, as well as winterizing the vehicle (so it starts well in cold weather, a cable to plug in, ice scrapers etc etc, they could also guarantee a GPS, Alamo will only say ‘it’s reserved subject to availability) All in all I felt that Alaska Auto Rentals were more honest and actually cared about the safety of their clients. The service was great. They picked us up from our airport hotel on a Sunday and out of hours, the car was upgraded and in great condition, the tires were perfect. The whole process was simple, honest and no hard selling. The car itself really made our holiday…with the Alamo car we would have been stuck around the local well maintained roads, and even that would be been potentially dangerous. With the winter tires we were able to explore all over, including driving to Denali National Park and in to the local hills and obscure places on very icy roads. The car handled perfectly. I’d hire from Alaska Auto Rentals every time….Honestly, don’t try and save money and think a little hire car from the airport will be ok and that they actually care about your safety…spend a little more, hire from Alaska Auto Rentals and have a wonderful time exploring...