Complaint Review: Enterprise Rent a Car - Nationwide

I rented an Enterprise Rent-A-Car compact car for $100/day at the Mercer County Airport in Trenton New Jersey.  I drove it to my Aunts House nearby, parked it, and drove it the next day to the Philadephia Airport and returned it.  I was charged $2000 for damage I did not do.  

When I rented the vehicle the agent printed my contract but was out of ink so there was a blank white page but the yellow and pink copies had information that printed through.  She had me sign the paperwork at the desk then we drove to the location of the car.  I got out of her car; she gave me the pink copy, I began to walk around the vehicle and noticed the hood had some scratches and the right front fender was not lined up straight but didn't look like an issue.  I pointed to it and made eye contact with the agent.  The agent remained in her vehicle and just stared at me, I assumed it wasn't a big deal.  I continued to walk around the vehicle and by the time I got to the driver's side door the agent had driven away with out even talking to me, writing mileage, or noting the scratches I had been pointing out.  I got in the car and drove away.  

I got in the car the next morning; it looked the same, fine.  I drove from Trenton NJ to Philadelphia Airprot.  This was less than 20 hours later.  When I pulled into the lot someone came to inspect the vehicle.  He proceeded to walk around it before I even turned the engine off.  He pulled on the right front fender where it had be misaligned, he pulled and pulled, shaking the car to the point where my daugeter inside woke up.  Then another agent came up and asked for me to look at the front fender which was by then, partially separated from the vechicle from being tugged at by the first agent.  I said I didn't do that and that I had pointed out,  to the renting agent, that the fender was misaligned.  There is no way I would have been able to drive  without hearing it bang around once the agent had ripped at it in such a way.  I got my receipt and left and noticed that they had also put the milage I drove on the receipt as 500 miles.  In no way did I drive even close to that far.  At most I drove 60 miles.  

They sent me a claim for damages to the fender and for every single little normal wear and tear scratch all over the car; I contested it.  I then received  a letter that they determined I owed the amount.  I've contacted enterprise to ask for a copy of the contract and no one has responded.  I received a letter stating I needed to report to my insurance.  I reported to State Farm and said that I wanted to contest this further.  They ended up just paying the claim.  I'm assuming they did this because a $2000 claim is not worth the manpower to contest.  

It has occured to me, after talking to other people, that these false claims against people who do not take their damage waiver, which by the way, was never even offered to me, might be a way for Enterprise to get their cars repaired, or possibly not repaired and they are keeping the money.  Either way it is wrong and I suddenly feel as though I am a small helpless consumer who really did nothing wrong and did not damage the rental in any way.  In fact, despight the grossly overpriced rental, I had enjoyed driving it.  

This kind of behavior from a company is not okay.  They know that claims like this will be paid by insurance companies before they would even fight it.  I worked  for enterprise for over 6 years a long time ago, I know how a rental should go, I know how they should be treating customers, and yet they have a team at the Mercer County Airport, Philadelphia Airport and a claims department who are taking advantage, not doing their jobs properly, scamming customers, and most likely allowing their employees get away with this without reprocussions or investigation.