ORLANDO, Fla. – Travelers heading to Orlando over the weekend were greeted by lengthy queues from several rental car companies at Orlando International Airport.
Lashon McAllister and her friends were in town from Baltimore to celebrate her birthday, but instead of rushing into the festivities, they waited in long lines to get their rental car.
“It is a horrible way to start my birthday trip,” McAllister said. “I’ve got anxiety, I’m ready to go I want to leave here.”
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McAllister said it wasn’t the first time she’s run into this problem at MCO.
“It’s not good, we gotta do better,” McAllister said. “These lines are terrible. We gotta do better.”
Gerald Glenn and his wife traveled from Utah. They also said the entire rental car experience has been a nightmare.
“It probably took me an hour and right now the line is probably two hours and they don’t have enough help and they spend a long, long time,” Glenn said. “It’s just not very automated.”
Glenn said they was able to get the car they paid for, but they weren’t offered an explanation as to why the line was so long.
“They didn’t say anything to me, the one right after me they apologized for the long delay, just a short ‘Sorry about the delay’ kind of thing and went on their way,” Glenn said.
Glenn said he and other customers agree, getting a rental car has become a huge hassle in recent years.
“It should be easier,” Glenn said. “And I heard people in line saying, ‘You know, we used to get car rentals so easy,’ and now it’s like this big, major process.”
The amount of high-volume events going on in one weekend have increased demand, according to airport spokesperson Carolyn Fennell.
Fennell said that during the pandemic, rental car companies reduced their inventory and have yet to get it back to pre-pandemic levels. Fennell added that Orlando is one of the hottest rental car markets in the country and a high demand and low inventory combination resulted in the problems that happened Sunday.
News 6 has reached out to several rental car companies operating at MCO which were experiencing long lines over the weekend.
This article will be updated if we hear back.
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