After reading ALL of the reviews for this location, I was REALLY nervous about picking up my car here, but it also helped me plan ahead. The ONLY reason I still decided to pick up from this location (as opposed to other rental companies, despite the awful reviews) was because of the open time on Saturdays (which was an hour ahead of most) any else I could find in the area.
As mentioned on a previous person's review, Avis has a ridiculously small desk located in a random corner inside the Hyatt Regency at 5 Embarcadero Center. After wandering for a moment, I decided just to ask someone where the desk was. They seem to be understaffed (as I also experienced seeing one guy at the desk, and waited as he finished a call).
Once I was with the attendant, I flew through the process, and was instructed to take my paperwork to the valet. They proceeded to call for my car, we did the traditional walk-around, and I was on my way to Napa. The car was relatively new and I had no problems from there.
When I returned the car, I left it with valet and returned to the counter to close out. From my experience, and based on what I have read from the other reviews, there were a few things that I was ready for going into the experience that made mine great.
Tip #1: Immediately ask the valet / concierge where the desk is located to save you search time in the hotel. If you haven't been here before, you will likely miss the location because they don't even have a great sign indicating their presence.
Tip #2: Set your pick-up for immediately when they open. Based on what everyone else has said, it looks like mid-day pickups are TERRIBLE (as I suppose you might expect for a location like this).
Tip #3: Be prepared to return the car during operating hours (OR prepare to drop off your car whenever with what I feel like is a high check-in cost). It's nice to know you can drop off at anytime, but it WILL cost you.
Tip #4: Prepare to wait. A consistent theme for all of these reviews thens to be lack of service. After reading this, I was ready to wait, but was pleasantly surprised when my experience took less than 15-minutes.
Tip #5: Make a Reservation & don't expect that they will have a car for you if you don't have a reservation (unlike airport locations where you can get lucky, at this place, I saw two walk-ups that were completely out of luck)
Seeing these other negative reviews, and even after my excellent experience, I am weary of trying my luck with this location again, but I likely will. We will see if I regret this 4-star review then. read more