U-Haul Phantom Traffic Ticket/Fee?

Interested in knowing if anyone else has experienced, after returning a U-haul rented moving truck back to U-haul, and after U-haul re-takes possession, later receiving notice that U-haul claims to have paid on your behalf a $25 traffic/parking ticket/citation (or any amount) with a $30 administrative fee (or any amount) and a $25 penalty (or any amount). Also you were charged an environmental fee. Basically, you know that YOU the customer did not personally receive the citation. The collection company hired by U-haul also tries to get the you to pay this alleged and disputed debt. No proof or validation of the actual citation, time, date, charges/grounds for the citation is ever produced.

Note: this post is from an Alabama attorney.  If you have a valid response, please leave a comment below, or email us and we will forward his email address to you. Thx. 

UPDATE 11/16/10: it appears that this attorney’s email addy is no longer active, so we are unable to forward any details until he contacts us again.  Still, you are encouraged to post your experiences regarding this topic as the information may be relevant anyway.

10 Responses to “U-Haul Phantom Traffic Ticket/Fee?”

  1. Sherry says:

    I got an alert today 5 weeks after renting a Uhaul saying I had a parking ticket. They took $130.00 dollar from my banking account. I was on the phone with at least 5 different people from uhaul. I finally got the guy to email the ticket and get this is was from New York. I used the uhaul in ga to move 85 miles had no extra charges received nothing about citation just seen in my bank. They stated it was a white van like really . I have a 20ft uhaul. The guy said he would reverse the charges. I got off the phone and called my bank they blocked my card sending mea new one. The email had the guy name and a picture of the ticket with state of New York on the top. I never been to that state. Then it had some scripture from the bible at the bottom of the email. This is some sort of scam. I get disability this was a huge chunk to be taken out. I been with my bank a long time and they can see in 5 weeks I have not left ga all the transactions. I was so upset and mad. This was private property the uhaul was parked on no hydrant on the copy of ticket said 0 feet from hydrant…. I hope they can catch whoever is doing this and uhaul shouldn’t make you but your card on websites or however they got. It was a nightmare and I’m waiting to get the money bk from my bank they are listing ít a fraud

    • Gina says:

      It happened to just this month of July 19-20, 2021.
      Received a text that I had a parking ticket violation. I am very sure that I did not get any parking ticket due to the fact that the rented car was in my own property when said the time and date of the ticket. $130 was collected from credit card without my authorization.
      UHAUL is a SCAM

  2. Xiaohan Mei says:

    I received a notice says I own them $150($120ticket+$30administrative fee) because of a parking ticket. The problem is I am so sure that I did not receive and parking ticket when I was having the car. How could they ask for so many money without any evidence?

  3. uhaul SUCKS says:

    Never rent uhaul!!!

  4. Rich T. says:

    My wife and I rented a U Haul cargo van back in the beginning of August 2015. We took a piece of furniture up to my daughter a few hundred miles away and came back the next day. We used our transponder on the way up and the same on the way back. On November 2016 I received out of the blue an email from U Haul with 2 citations for apparently 2 tolls on the way back on Aug 2 2015 that the transponder did not register. That’s 15 months later. I called U Haul to ask them how it’s possible that I get a notice like this 15 months later, to which they told me sometimes they don’t get notified by the EZ Pass authority for quite some time. After speaking with EZ Pass I was told that they send out notice on these kinds of missed tolls within 14 days of the occurrence. So now I don’t know who to believe, and on top of everything else, U Haul is after me to $130.35–ON TOLLS THAT TOTAL A MERE $11.95. To top it off, when I asked to speak with a supervisor at U Haul I was told they were on another call and would call me back. Then when I called them 4 hours later, they said the supervisor is still busy and he’d get back to me. That was 2 weeks ago. I’ve since received a notice from their collection agency after me for the first part of the amount due–$64.45. Is it even possible that I’m going to have my credit rating screwed up over this? I think I’m going to make a positive step in my eyes and simply send U Haul the $11.95 I owe, cc their collection agency, and see what happens. If U Haul does not get notice of these missed tolls until charge and fees have been assessed, then I think they have a beef with EZ Pass. But to try and pass this off to the customer is offensive at best. And I didn’t even go into what happened to us on the way back in their crappy van. We discovered a mouse crawling around the cabin, and at one point up onto my wife’s lap, to which I veered off of the expressway going about 60 MPH onto a grassy patch to try and get the darn thing out of the van. I called U Haul and asked for another van but they only cared that the van we were driving was operational and couldn’t do anything for us. We spent 2 hours trying to figure out where the rodent got to, ultimately not finding it and against the will of my poor wife, drove the remaining 1 1/2 hours home while she watched the darn thing come in an out from under my seat around my feet as I’m driving. The idiot who rented it from us would do nothing, nor would U Haul corporation. It was so important for them to preserve their income stream over my short term rental instead offering any kind of compensation. So here I am a year later, thinking I simply won’t ever rent from them again and will be sure to spread my horror story around related to the mouse, and I get more bad news from them. First a stupid mouse in the van and now late citations. When will the saga end?

  5. James says:

    This is the second time I have received one of these “citation” notices. Both times I towed a tiny 5×8 single-axle trailer on the same 7-mile stretch of toll road that I have seen many trucks and semis using. The first time late last year, I paid the alleged “fine” because I did not know with all the cameras they use on this toll road to bill customers in their “toll by plate” program, that they would bill u-haul instead of me. I paid the u-haul notice because I considered it to be a small screw-up and did not want to deal with it.

    Today I received two e-mails, supposedly from u-haul “collections department,” that show two separate citations for $32 plus $2.08/$2.20 plus a $5 “administrative fee” that have to be paid within 7 days to avoid collection activity. When I click on the link to u-haul collections, they tell me they are kidding about the $32, but I owe the $2.08 and $2.20 (for the same 7-mile trip with one extra axle, billed within 4 minutes of each other), and the $5 fee for a total of $9.28. If I don’t pay within 7 days, it says, I will be liable for the additional $30 fine. My experience with this toll expressway is that they give you 30 days to pay from the time they bill, not 1 week to pay.

    I have no complaints with u-haul in general, but it seems that they would rather rent trucks and make the trailer-towing experience that built their business into a big pain in the butt. I installed a hitch on my car to save money over the exorbitant mileage fees and fuel costs of u-haul truck rental. I drove at least 500 miles with that rig, lost only 5mpg, paid at least $20 in cash tolls (even though my car with trailer weighs much less than their 2-axle truck), and feel like u-haul and the government got a fair price for my use of the roads. I don’t mind getting a bill for the toll. I paid the rest of them, why not this one? But getting the bum’s rush and paying an extra fee for an account they probably pay regularly, is an insult to my business as a regular customer. I’m sure they would rather I drove a nice expressway than thread through tight city traffic. Makes buying my own for the cost of a few rentals look better and better.

  6. Unsatisfied Customer says:

    The same thing just happened to me. The toll was assessed on 3/22/14 but the toll company didn’t charge Uhaul till October of 2014. They stated they text or sent an email notifying me of the $7.00 toll and tried to charge the credit card on file but it didn’t go through.

    I just received the first notification of a citation last week, through mail but it was from a collection agency Vengroff Williams and they added a $30 admin fee.

    I spoke with both the collection agency and lastly Uhaul @888 886 0782. After 4 to 5 very frustrating phone calls I finally received a return call from a manager at Uhaul’s corporate office in AZ. He stated it was in their contract that a $30 admin fee would be charged to any outstanding tolls or citations. I stated the tunnels in this area don’t give you the option of paying at a booth and it had to be tie to an EZPASS or charged to the license’s plate. He actually said, “you could have gone a different route to avoid any toll roads”.

    I informed him I was never notified of any tolls unpaid and that their policy is to charge tolls to the card they have on file. I advised him that FDCPA guidelines require written notification to customers to allow them an opportunity to pay before being referred over to a collection agency. He stated they sent a text message and an email. I advised him that Uhaul violated TCPA federal guidelines that restricts any company from using text message or a customer’s cell phone in an attempt to collect as debt, without documented written or verbal consent. I know we never chose electronic billing or gave them permission to use our cell phone. He stated they tried to charge it on our card but it didn’t go through. I told him he was lying because I always keep a running 20k plus balance on the debit card they have on file. He tried to give me a discounted admin fee charge but I refused it. I said I wasn’t going to pay a penny over the 7.00 toll that was suppose to be originally billed. I also stated that if the 30.00 admin fee wasn’t waived entirely that I was going to the local new media and writing in to my Congressman and the Better Business Bureau to advise them of this “gap” in their business operations. I stated to the manager that he knows what Uhaul is doing is wrong and it was a way to increase revenue.

    He finally waived the admin fee and took my 7.00 payment over the phone. I am certain there are hundreds of these cases out there. It’s a scam and they need to be called out on it.

  7. Justin says:

    Hi, I recieved one of these “citation letters as well.

    Here’s how mine was handled:

    1. I googled U-haul citation customer service, number is 1-800-789-3638 and/or 1-800-go-uhaul.

    2. I requested information as to who, what, when, where, and why(played 20 questions basically) to find out exactly what the $21.06 plus $30 admin fee for Vengroff Williams, Inc. had originated from.

    3. In talking with the rude-as-all-get-out phone operator, I put 2 and 2 together. I had rented an open top trailer, 10ft if I remember correctly, to move my GF’s grandma in October of 2010. I used a toll road and racked up $21.06 Neither the State of Texas(NTTA), where the tolls roads were, nor U-Haul ever tried to contact me about paying these tolls, yet both entities have my contact number, mailing address and email. Supposedly Uhaul recieved the toll bill in August 2012 and decided to instantly refer it to a collections agency without notifying me that I owed them for the tolls that they paid on my behalf to NTTA. “I think that is an infringement on my credit rights or something, but not sure how to get that absolved or corrected.” Anyways, I paid the $51.06 and was instructed to call the collection agency to follow up and make sure they dropped the claim against me with all 3 credit bureaus(Experian, Trans-Union, and Equifax). I have yet to recieve a call back after 2 voice mails and numerous calls to the number on the bill. The Lady’s name on the bill is Lauren Rae. I’m tempted to contact a lawyer about possible fraud, but don’t even know where to start, I mean is a couple thousand bucks in attorney’s fees really worth the $51.06 I paid to hopefully clear the wrongfull collection account from my credit?

    Any thoughts or comments would be appreciated. 🙂

    Screw U-Haul!!

  8. arif says:

    Hi I have received a citation
    I had called Uhaul after recieving it , and i was told , this was wrongly charged to me

    But i got one more letter , asking me to pay for this

    I do not know what to do

  9. Anjie says:

    Hi, I have had this experience and would like to know what you suggest doing. Thanks.

Leave a Reply for Anjie