Stolen Rental Car Part Four

A couple of miracles occurred today with regards to the stolen rental car. I contacted the police department again and left a message for my responding police officer to give me a call regarding the recovered rental car. He actually returned my call, and seemed puzzled as to why I wanted to speak to him. He did not realize the car had been located, but when he looked at the police report he could see that it had been found by the city police and that I had been contacted. I asked him if the car had made it to their lot, and he said no. He ended up calling their towing vendor, and they said they had no record of my car. He then found out that the car was still in the lot used by St. Louis city police. He said they have no intentions of taking possession of the car to dust for fingerprints as they have more serious crimes to attend to than a stolen car. This statement confirms my suspicions on how my case has been treated from the beginning. At least I know where I stand with this.

The second miracle is that when I called this same police department and asked for records, I actually got a live person and not the recording to leave a message as I had the previous five times I have called. The lady checked into my case, said the record was ready and could be released, but that I had to go to her city's website and fill out a form and pay $10. Then she can email me the report. I have done that, so now I wait for the email.

Since I was on a positive roll, I again called Budget's customer service number to request a copy of my rental agreement - for the fourth or fifth time. This representative asked how close I was to the rental office so I could just go in there and get a copy. I explained that I am in North Carolina and the office is in St. Louis. He then said I was talking to reservations and not customer service, which is odd because it is the same number I called all the other times when I spoke to customer service reps. He said he would transfer me, but after fifteen minutes on hold, I hung up. I went ahead and filled out a form online to try to get a copy of my agreement, and I attached a copy of my confirmation email showing that I had indeed rented the car. I just got an email back from them stating that since I made the reservation online, no signature is required so they cannot provide me with a signed agreement. I need the signed agreement for the insurance claim. What a trick bag I am in!

Stolen Rental Car Part Three

Budget Fastbreak

With Budget I am a Fastbreak member, and have been for many years. I reserve my car online and either go to a special line when I pick the car up or am told through the app where to get my car and bypass a line altogether. When I rented a car from them in Des Moines earlier in September, I checked in at a desk in the airport but was given no paperwork. She just went from my confirmation number.

In St. Louis I was directed to a spot in the Budget lot, but no car was there so we had to go inside the building. Again, I gave the clerk my confirmation number and she checked my drivers license before telling me which Avis spot to go to. When we left the parking lot, a woman scanned our transponder and checked my drivers license to make sure it matched their records. Again, I was given no paperwork and I didn't think anything of it.

When I logged into my Budget account at home, mysteriously only the Des Moines rental shows up. Not the St. Louis rental. I called customer service to request a copy of my rental agreement, and the gal apologized that it hadn't been emailed to me following my rental. She requested my reservation number, which I gave her, confirmed my email address and said I would have it within four hours. Two days later it had not arrived. I called customer service again, and a different gal said she didn't see a copy of my agreement, and that she would have to request it from the local (St. Louis) office. She said that would take 7-10 business days, and then it would be emailed to me. 

Two weeks later I still don't have it, so I called again. This time the gal said that it looked like I had never signed a rental agreement, and that I would have to contact the St. Louis office myself. She provided me with a phone number, which actually took me to the airport itself and not Budget. The man who answered kindly gave me the Budget number. When you call that number, you get a series of choices and none of them takes you to a live person. Most of them dump you back into the main Budget customer service center. I'm at a loss as to what to do with them at this point.

In the meantime I have called the police department records center five times, never getting a live person but only a recording. Five times I have requested the police report for my stolen car, explaining that I need if for filing a claim on the car. I have received no callbacks.

Very early in the morning on Friday, October 25th I received a phone message from a police officer in the district where the car had been stolen, telling me that a City of St. Louis police officer had found my rental car. The message gave me the officer's name and told me to call the city police. A phone number would have been helpful to me. After muddling my way through the various phone options, I left a message last Friday but did not hear back from him.

The city police officer works nights, so I had to figure out when I could call that he would be there. So on Tuesday I called at 5:30 CST and was able to talk to him. He said that a male from Avis/Budget saw that their stolen car was pinging at a certain address, and asked that they try to locate the car. The officer responded and found the car where they said it was pinging. He told me the car did not appear to be damaged, and the dash looked okay though he didn't have a key to get into it. He saw a female driver's license on the floor of the back seat, but couldn't tell if it was mine. This is interesting because a woman (maybe) reached out to me through Facebook Messenger to tell me that her grandson had found my driver's license, and that she has it in her possession. She wanted to talk to me. I checked out her Facebook profile, and things seemed a little sketchy to me so I didn't talk to her. If my license is really in the car still, she was obviously on a fishing expedition.

The city cop also said the Florida plate had been switched out to one from Missouri. They took the car to their impound lot as the other police department said they would come and get it so they could process it for fingerprints. As of the time he and I talked, the car was still in the city lot. 

I left a message for the original responding officer to call me with an update on the case since the car has been recovered. I am curious to know if any of my other personal items are in the trunk. I'm hoping he will call me back, and that he can assist me in being able to get a copy of their police report.

Stolen Rental Car Part Two

With the warning that I needed to be at the airport really early in order to try and get clearance to fly without any identification, we were dropped off at Lambert St. Louis International Airport three hours before our flight. We first stopped at the American counter, where you normally have to show your driver's license to get your boarding pass. It helped, I think, that I had a credit card with my name on it as it had been in the gas pump when the car was stolen. The desk agent printed out my boarding pass, as well as Jim's, and directed us to TSA downstairs. 

When we got to the TSA agent, I explained that my rental car had been stolen, along with my purse, ID, and all my luggage. He asked if I had a piece of mail on me. Really? I said I had nothing but my credit card. At that point he called for another TSA agent, and had us stand off to the side. A female agent came to get me, and told Jim he had to go on through the checkpoint as he normally would. She took me to a separate desk, where she proceeded to ask me a bunch of questions. Then she said she had to call someone else (Homeland Security?), and explained that they would ask me a series of questions. She said I would only have one try to answer them correctly. Okay, no pressure... I guess I did okay, but then she took my new phone, my credit card, and one of my shoes for a special test. I went through the security line, and got some extra patting down. All that was just fine with me, and I was able to board and go home. I do have global entry status, and I'm wondering if that helped. 

Our neighbor picked us up at the airport in Charlotte, and while driving home we noticed that both Jim and I had a bunch of "No Name" calls on our phones. When he got one that said Creve Coeur, he answered in case it was something to do with the car. It turned out to be a north county police officer who was looking for me. I took the call, and it ends up he had found my suitcase and my iPad. He had gone to the parking lot of an apartment complex to arrest a suspect in a different car theft. When he got out of his car, he saw a transponder laying in the lot. His first thought was that it had been pulled out of a rental car, so he started searching the area. Thats when he found my suitcase and the luggage tag nearby that they had torn off. He also found the iPad, which he opened up. He saw a message from someone asking if I got home okay. He just asked me to describe the iPad, which I could as it has a case on it.

He told me I needed to pick up my stuff by 7:00 that day as that is when his shift ended. If I didn't come and get it, it would be boxed up and taken to the central headquarters in Clayton, and it would be harder for me to retrieve. I explained that I was back in Charlotte, but would see if a friend could come and get it. I admit that I was surprised they didn't want to dust the items for fingerprints, but maybe I've watched too much crime t.v. My friend was able to go and collect my stuff, and we did a FaceTime call when he got back to his house and opened up the suitcase. It was obvious that they had gone through everything as my packing cubes were all emptied out. Some items (like the iPad and my pickleball paddle) had been in the backpack, but the paddle was now in the suitcase. My friend shipped the suitcase and iPad to me the next day.

When I received my stuff, the suitcase was all muddy but in good working condition. As I went through everything, I realized that the packing cube with my dirty laundry in it was missing. So I didn't get back some pickleball clothes, underwear, shorts and shirts. Also out of my makeup bag they took my mascara, nail clippers and tweezers. The backpack, which has not been found, contained ear buds, my purse, charging cords for all my devices, sports glasses and a pair of sandals. 

The thieves managed to use my debit card (even though they didn't have the PIN number) five times before the bank shut my card down. They used it immediately after the theft of the car, so before I was able to finally get to a phone to call and cancel the card. My bank's fraud department is taking care of the charges. I called the police department where the car had been stolen and told them the addresses where my air pods and phone were located, and also where the debit card had been used. I talked to a detective (not the responding cop), and he said the debit card locations would be very helpful. And I said yes, especially if they can match the description with my eyewitness. He said, "You had an eyewitness?" And I told him about the lady on the motorcycle. I said she couldn't hang around and wait for the police as they were trying to outrun the rain from the hurricane, but she gave us her card. He asked if I gave it to the cop, and I said we tried to but he said he didn't need it as he would review the surveillance tape. Which then made me ask the detective if they had seen the tape? He said there was no record of it, so I was sure it was long erased by then. While I had him on the phone, I told him I had left two messages with his department requesting the police report. I need it for insurance purposes. He said it would be 7-10 days before it would be available. He did take down the names and numbers of the two people who had been filling up the same time as me.

In reviewing our documents, I found that the credit card I used to pay for the car rental covers damage as well as theft of rental cars. I have rental car coverage on my automobile policy, but I decided to file the claim through the credit card company instead. Virginia Surety handles these claims, and they need a copy of the police report and rental agreement to process the claim. I also filled out on online claim form with Budget to cover all my bases with them. They, too need a copy of the police report.

Little did I know how problematic it would be to get a police report or a rental agreement. Stay tuned...