Can I rent a car at SFO and return in the city the next day after 6 PM?

January 19, 2015 1:59 PM

I am traveling to SF in a few weeks, arriving mid-afternoon on Thursday at SFO. I am planning to drive to Davis the same day, spending the Friday at UCD, and drive back to SF around 6 PM, where I'll stay. Ideally, I would not have to drive to SFO and shlep back to downtown, but return the car in the city that same Friday evening, or first take a cab downtown upon arrival to a local rental company that does offer (somewhat) later returns. To my surprise, it appears to be impossible to return a rental car in SF after 6 PM to a company that offers pickup at SFO. What am I missing?

I have no overnight parking options in SF and no time to return on Saturday. I am staying in an apartment, not a hotel with a rental car desk. Not a US citizen so Getaround is not an option. Expedia and Yelp forums have not proved helpful.

posted by gijsvs to Travel & Transportation around San Francisco, CA (8 answers total)

If you are willing to BART/taxi/shuttle into downtown on Thursday to pick up the car, I would recommend City Rent-A-Car. I used them several times while living in the Bay Area, and always thought their service was great (not to mention relatively cheap). They have after-hours dropoff on Fridays, until 1am at a garage near Union Square, for an additional $15; check their FAQ for details.

They don't have pickup at SFO listed on their website, but it might be worth calling and asking, because they do offer SFO dropoff. It might be worth their while to let you pay to bring the car back into the city, instead of them having to pay an employee or other service to do so.
posted by zebra at 2:16 PM on January 19, 2015

I don't see what you mean, I just tried to rent a car using your dates via Alamo at SFO and return to Union Square(downtown) at 6:30pm the next day and no problem. They ding you for an extra day of you go over 24 hours though.
posted by Zedcaster at 2:19 PM on January 19, 2015

Orbitz will let you do this one-way search. Unfortunately (if you're on a budget), the ultra-cheap CA rental companies like Fox don't seem to have downtown locations, but I think you can still get out of this for well under $100 using Zedcaster's excellent Alamo suggestion.
posted by ftm at 4:15 PM on January 19, 2015

Have you tried calling the rental car agency? I have dropped off a rental car at a downtown rental office after hours before. I had to just leave the car in their lot and put the keys in a box. But I made arrangements with them on the phone. I don't remember which rental agency it was but one of the major ones. There might have been an extra fee.
posted by interplanetjanet at 9:02 PM on January 19, 2015

Just to raise another option: you could take BART from the airport to the Richmond station, and transferred to the Capitol Corridor Amtrak train, and take that to Davis. It will be cheaper, and likely less of a hassle, than a car rental.
posted by purplevelvet at 12:33 AM on January 20, 2015

Response by poster: Thanks for your suggestions folks -- Zedcaster + ftm, I inquired only through websites (including Alamo's) and they simply said no, also no dropoff & keys in a box. I've done this before and was surprised this is not offered as a option anymore.
I like the BART + Amtrak idea. Will look into that.
posted by gijsvs at 12:45 AM on January 20, 2015

We had the same problem when we rented a car and wanted to drop it off in downtown San Francisco: nothing was open past 6. We ended up doing the drop-off at SFO and BART into downtown thing, which took a long time (especially figuring out how to get to the car drop off place).
posted by urbanlenny at 1:16 PM on January 20, 2015

Ask if you can Drop off at Oakland Airport and take Bart into the city
posted by gt2 at 3:44 AM on January 21, 2015