From a customer’s point of view, absolutely.

But fees are many times also used to avoid or evade taxes and royalties. For example, resort fees can be used by hotels to avoid paying royalties to the franchisor.

There is never any good excuse to hide or gatekeep the total price from a customer though.

You're right. I was thinking about Airbnb, which has cleaning fees that can be pretty hefty on one-night rentals. And those are understandable because someone needs to come in and change the sheets/towels, wash dishes, etc.

But there's no "bedsheets" analog for a car rental. Yes, it needs to be washed, but I imagine most renters of Priuses don't actually care if the car hasn't been washed in a few days/weeks.

I agree that that service should be considered in the price of the rental, but I disagree that it should be separate from the rest of the rental fee. It's required, and it's only separated out to make the rental look cheaper, right up until you get hit with that fee.

>it's only separated out to make the rental look cheaper, right up until you get hit with that fee

That's certainly one reason. But it can also make sense to have a one-time fee that's independent of the duration of the rental. Cleaning a room is the most obvious example. But there are other more or less fixed overheads that are largely independent of the length of time something is rented.

If you're renting out just about anything, would you prefer seven 1-day rentals or a one week rental?

That's not quite true. The car has to be inspected and gotten ready for rental.

Consider the amount of work involved for the owner in renting one car to 30 people each for one day and one car to one person for 30 days and you'll see the difference.

> those are understandable because someone needs to

Nope. The rest of this sentence doesn't even matter: if someone needs to do something, that's a reason to charge for it, but not a reason to hide the price.

I'm waiting for the "free" car rental where the actual cost is wrapped up in fees.