Barbara, sorry, I'm not sure what your point is.Rental cars are a slightly different business model. One can normally get unlimited mileage deals as the hire companies know the average/maximum mileage people normally drive in a day or week and factor that into the fixed charges. Why wouldn't people drive long distances? The reason people hire cars is to tour around foreign parts: if one's touring the US one can clock up a lot of miles from Seattle to LA via San Francisco and Vegas, even San Diego to San Francisco return is a fair mileage but not untypical, and a trip round the Keys, Everglades also taking in Naples, St Petersburg and Miami in Florida clocks up a reasonable mileage. Closer to home trips around the archaeological sites in Greece and Italy takes in a few miles, and the Dali Triangle in Spain is more modest but difficult without a hire car. Yes, if one picks up a parking ticket in, say, San Francisco it's worth paying it promptly before it gets into to car hire bureaucracy. Leasing is different. One usually pays a monthly fee based on an estimated mileage for the lease term (often three years); exceed the agreed mileage and there's a charge per mile. However, the registered user isn't usually the owner or the lessor, or, in the case of a company car, even the lessee: it's the person who actually uses it so any penalty notices go direct to the user who is responsible on a day-to-day basis for the car. (Ok, in the cases of private leases this will usual be the lessee.) I've also discussed the information security model of lease cars with people in the motor and cyber security industries and this model isn't quite correct yet. Those leasing second hand cars with sophisticated electronics have sometimes seen previous lessees' personnel information as manufacturers don't always differentiate between different lessees for the same car and VIN owned by a lessor. I'm sure that will get resolved. Car clubs like Zipcar are different, they're really intended for local journeys in or around a city like London and they usually are more expensive for longer journeys but then there's also a trade off with convenience. One wouldn't use a club car to drive from London to Newcastle, Edinburgh or Penzance. The sensible option there is to take the train and hire a car locally if one's touring and doesn't own a car.Anyway, my point is like it or not it's the motor manufacturers wanting to change the ownership model and that will likely assist the move to road charging. It's a political decision but given the congestion on our roads I guess it will happen sometime. Interestingly, I also understand many car manufacturers would like to cut out car dealers and sell directly to customers to keep control over sale terms, product and customers, and because some dealers have poor reputations - particularly in the second hand car market. There's obviously pushback from dealers and from a practical perspective dealers are useful for arranging test drives, delivery and servicing but it may change to more of an agency relationship where the customer's contract is with the manufacturer and the dealer collects a commission for supporting the sale and after sale services.
Michael Ixer ● 659d