I refused to pay the $75 gate fee in Newark and it backfired hard

Honestly everyone in this community says just pay the extra fee for terminal pickup, but I want to push back on that after what happened to me last month. I had a car coming from Phoenix to Newark and the dispatcher quoted me $1,150 if I picked it up at the terminal, or $75 more for residential drop off at my place in Jersey City. I said forget it and took the cheaper option, figuring I'd just grab an Uber over. The car sat at the terminal for two extra days past the promised window because they only release vehicles between 9am and 2pm on weekdays, and I work those exact hours. I ended up burning a vacation day, paying $48 for the Uber there and back, and standing around for almost 3 hours while they shuffled cars around the lot. Between the lost pay and the rides, that gate fee would have been the bargain of the century. Has anyone else done the math on whether the terminal savings is ever actually real, or am I the only one who got burned by it?

1 comments

Log in to join the discussion

Log In

1 Comment

jessew838d ago

Paying that fee usually wins once you do the math on your own time and missed work, so your story checks out. The catch is that the fee only pays off when you actually have a flexible schedule and live close to the terminal anyway. For most people stuck on a 9 to 5, the "cheaper" terminal pickup ends up costing way more than the $75.

4