ACRA president Sharky Laguana urges attendees at the International Car Rental Show on April 16 to help advocate for legislation and regulator rollbacks that can spare rental car operators unnecessary business costs.
Photo: Ross Stewart / Stewart Digital Media
As the American Car Rental Association prepares for another legislative conference in Washington, D.C., its president underscored how the group represents the businesses that run rental car fleets.
If you run a business, there are two things you need: To grow your revenue and your profit, said ACRA president Sharky Laguana on April 16 during the International Car Rental Show in Las Vegas. “And the way to grow your profit is either grow your revenue or reduce your expenses.”
While ACRA cannot help much with growing revenue for an individual company, it can help cut expenses through its advocacy in stopping legislation that raises costs, he emphasized.
ACRA has two missions: To educate rental car operators and advocate on their behalf. The trade group now represents 98% of all cars rented in America. Anywhere from one out of seven to one out of 10 cars sold in America are bought by ACRA members.
It will hold its annual D.C. Car Rental Conference Sept. 15-18 at the Westin Arlington Gateway/Ballston Hotel in Virginia and at the U.S. Capitol. A few hundred rental car industry leaders and operators convene at the event each year for governmental, regulatory, and legislative briefings and training to lobby Congressional representatives and staff.
In one example of an ACRA legislative success, Laguana described to ICRS attendees how thieves using fake IDs rented one of his vans from his San Francisco-based company and then stole it.
A state law forbids a rental company from turning on GPS to track an unreturned vehicle until three days after it’s overdue. When Laguana did, the vehicle was located deep in Southern Mexico, which amounts to a total loss of the $70,000 van. Because the renters used fake IDs, his company technically handed them the keys, so any insurer would categorize the incident as a conversion, not a theft. It wasn’t covered.
While ACRA prefers no waiting period, Laguana explained how his situation and that of any other rental car operator could have been worse. The 3-day law was one he and ACRA advocated that modified a previous law requiring a 5-day waiting period and a letter of notice to the vehicle renter.
The legislation lowering the day limit had resulted from a separate previous incident where Laguana happened to notice one of his stolen vans pulling in front of him on the highway. He chased the rental van while calling the police department, which did not respond, so he had to “bluff the thieves into giving me my own car back.”
Laguana then tweeted about it which spurred enough attention that ultimately led to then-Gov. Jerry Brown signing ACRA-pushed legislation lowering the GPS access days.
“I was able to get the bill across the finish line because I had help,” Laguana said. “We can’t do this alone. It is the relationships that the (ACRA) members have with each other, with all the different companies with all the different legislators” that leads to success.