Enterprise Holdings reported that almost 8,000 of its approximately 35,000 recalled Toyota and Pontiac Vibe vehicles have had their sticky accelerator recall service performed, and the vehicles have been returned to its Alamo Rent A Car, Enterprise Rent-A-Car and National Car Rental locations in North America.
The vehicles, identified for recall and suspension of sales due to potential problems with sticking accelerator pedals, represent about 4 percent of the company’s entire North American fleet. Enterprise Holdings is working closely with Toyota to repair all affected vehicles and return them to service as soon as possible. Further, in response to Toyota’s recall yesterday, Enterprise Holdings also is performing the recall service in accord with Toyota’s instructions on the model year 2010 Prius vehicles.
“Our top priority throughout this entire process has been safeguarding the safety and trust of our customers, and that remains our focus going forward,” said Matt Darrah, executive vice president-North American Operations for Enterprise Holdings, which owns and operates the Alamo, Enterprise and National brands. “We are in constant communication with our dealer partners across North America to ensure that all recall service work is performed promptly and efficiently.”
The company is coordinating with Toyota to expedite the recall work in a number of ways. In some cases, the repairs are being made at local dealerships, while in other locations Toyota technicians are doing the work on site at Alamo, Enterprise and National locations. In some airport locations that have on-site service centers, Toyota is training company technicians to make the repairs.
Enterprise Holdings is North America’s largest and most comprehensive car rental company, with more than a third of all airport business in the U.S. and Canada. In addition, the company operates more than 5,000 Enterprise Rent-A-Car offices located within 15 miles of 90 percent of the U.S. population. Darrah noted: “The flexibility provided by our unique coast-to-coast network has minimized customer inconvenience and delays as we are able to quickly move vehicles between cities and from airports to nearby neighborhood branch offices — and vice versa.”
None of the vehicles in the company’s car sharing fleet, operated under the WeCar brand, has been affected by either of these safety recalls. The WeCar brand, a natural extension of Enterprise Rent-A-Car’s local business rental program, offers mostly hybrids and plug-in vehicles to business customers looking to enhance their fleet management operations and sustainability initiatives. Darrah stated that all new Priuses will have their anti-lock brake (ABS) software updated before they enter the WeCar car-sharing fleet.
