Pros:Staff when we dropped off was good (though it was a non-Payless person filling in at the counter), as was the helpful agent at a faraway location, when we had to switch cars halfway through our trip. Car itself was totally fine and a good value for the money.
Cons:Picking up at the Jamaica location was terrible. Nobody was at the Payless counter and repeated phone calls where someone promised to page someone and bring them out were fruitless. Eventually we were able to get served in the huge line which was covering all the other agencies in the same area. The guy who helped us was very abrupt and kept walking away from us so that he could juggle 2-3 customers at the same time. I felt for him since it seemed like he was having to do several people's jobs, but then he was also a SERIOUS obstructionist when we wanted to add a second driver - sticking "by the book" to require not only photo ID but a separate credit card for this person, something I've never seen at another rental agency. I looked it up later, and okay, that's their policy --- but guess what? What we actually did was drive out of our way to another Payless to add the other driver. This time we had the credit card in hand, but THIS person never once asked for it! So clearly the system doesn't actually require this document to add a second driver, and the first person was just arbitrarily wielding power. This totally threw off our schedule for starting our trip and was a major bummer. The other thing about Payless is the phone customer service is a total maze of people forwarding you to other people; I've gotten legit three different answers to the question of how to pay e-tolls (the transponder in our second car was broken and not picking them up) and how much the added fees would be. One guy was extremely combative for no reason when I was just asking questions to clarify whether I would be paying X or Y. In general I would say, go ahead and pay a little more for a slightly better rental car company - the headaches aren't worth it.