Hertz Go

Product Strategy · Systems Design · Connected Mobility · Frictionless UX

Timeline

6 Months

My Title

UI/UX Designer

Website

Hertz

Before

The rental pickup process was the #1 friction point for travelers:

Long lines after exhausting flights
“Skip the counter” only worked for limited cars
First-come-first-served meant delays = poor selection
Confusing lots and single-lane exits caused major backups
Employees bore the brunt of customer frustration

Hertz needed a smarter, less painful pickup experience.

The rental pickup process was the #1 friction point for travelers:

Long lines after exhausting flights
“Skip the counter” only worked for limited cars
First-come-first-served meant delays = poor selection
Confusing lots and single-lane exits caused major backups
Employees bore the brunt of customer frustration

Hertz needed a smarter, less painful pickup experience.

What I did

Led user research to unpack the pain of post-flight rentals
Created the concept of Digital Choice: real-time, class-based vehicle selection
Collaborated with hardware + ops to test remote vehicle access via OBD2
Designed flows for ID pre-validation and contactless gate exit (with CLEAR)
Balanced tech feasibility with human fallback systems for scale

Impact

Hertz Go transformed a high-friction moment into a self-service win, reducing staffing needs, protecting employee morale, and giving customers the control they wanted. It wasn’t the fully automated future we dreamed of, but it was a pragmatic leap forward.