Not sure about the rental class and duration... but seeing these totals for a rental car raised my eyebrows by surprise. I guess the prices went way way up...
Weekly deals are often better than daily, not sure if there are monthly deals. Probably there should be some kind of long-term special deals too.
I had done some research too, so knew a credit card was needed, but somehow had missed the part where it had to be in the same name as the driver. As I said, here in Norway I've rented cars many times without driving them, no questions asked.
I get that they prefer a credit card, but it didn't cross my mind they cared which one they got. The manager said it was because I could claim I had nothing to do with the rental, which I get now, I just hadn't thought about all these ways of scamming the rental company.
I had no problem paying with my credit card for a n Avis rental with a contract written out to and signed by my spouse at the time.
That was in the UK.
For some weird reason, I was charged way less than quoted at the reservation (~$2300 instead of ~$3700), seems like Alamo somehow forgot to charge the "Extra - Time & Distance" line on my reservation invoice. Can't really complain.