[tanwaramit]

When I read the story, I tried to read again and again, and went through several time to see where is the quote, your experience and more about Uber pool. But could not find it.

However, the picture made an immediate connect with the picture on first post of this thread.

The initiative still holds good. May be Uber didn't handle it properly, however efforts are good and Kudos to you for doing it (even though for short duration). I am not sure, but read that Uber did help its cabbies when their cars were impounded.

Not that I am taking their side.

I for one, am interested in taking up Uber pool as a passenger, cant give my car as its very old model and wont be accepted. But would want to be part of the pooling group.

[sharninder]

Originally Posted by duke

Inspired by this post, I signed up as well. However, it appears I've had my share of hostile riders who get offended the minute you tell them its a ride share and not a cab. Not sure what gets them infuriated by 100% of the 9 odd people I've accepted on the app and called up have been more than fair share of rude.

So the riders don't know if its a cab or a ride share? Not saying, I'd mind, but I think Uber should make this clear in it's interface for users.

[shankar.balan]

How are you managing the insurance part? As a private car owner, technically your insurance will not allow you to ply your vehicle for commercial purposes or for commercial gain either.

I really would want to know more about how this aspect is being handled.

[contact.nitin7]

Many thanks to @quickdraw for the updates.

I have got my Registration accepted too, they have added a few more quick help Question and Answers recently.

Attaching them here.

[Rajeevraj]

Originally Posted by shankar.balan

How are you managing the insurance part? As a private car owner, technically your insurance will not allow you to ply your vehicle for commercial purposes or for commercial gain either.

I really would want to know more about how this aspect is being handled.

I think any potential commercial gain is a by-product. This is being projected as a car pool initiative. The way uber will project this is that they are using the Uber platform to connect riders who are interested in pooling andto ensure that the driver gets reimbursed the car pool share from the others who share the ride.

In addition a private driver is allowed only 2 trips per day. There definitely will be a small commercial gain, but considering that there is no accurate measurement of running expenses and it is only 2 trips per day, it will be very difficult to clearly prove commercial gain.

In case of a claim. The driver was driving to/from office, co passengers were car pooling. No reason to deny a claim.

It's all pretty vague and I guess that's what Uber is exploiting.

[shankar.balan]

Originally Posted by Rajeevraj

In case of a claim. The driver was driving to/from office, co passengers were car pooling. No reason to deny a claim.

It's all pretty vague and I guess that's what Uber is exploiting.

Will the insurance companies view it in quite the same light?
I always wonder about this - in the unfortunate event of an accident, will the Insurance company cough up what it is supposed to when very clearly, the activity being engaged in, is, strictly speaking, in contravention?

[Rajeevraj]

Originally Posted by shankar.balan

Will the insurance companies view it in quite the same light?
I always wonder about this - in the unfortunate event of an accident, will the Insurance company cough up what it is supposed to when very clearly, the activity being engaged in, is, strictly speaking, in contravention?

True. No reference to insurance anywhere in their faqs. Guess we need to wait for a private driver to experience it. Or maybe Uber already has a buy off from insurance companies.

[joelchandra]

This is quiet an interesting thing. I did that in the US and i could very easily drive around with passengers on those days when i was doing nothing. It does give you a good profit out there. Here in India, the concept seem to be Car pooling for Private cars. Will register tonight and see how it translates.

[quickdraw]

Update:

I've been trying to use the Uber Pool as much as I can, unfortunately still haven't gotten a chance to sign up the ECO SPORT on the platform which limits me to only even days when I can use the car. In 1 hour of the app being on you can usually expect 2-3 rider requests. Unfortunately there are a lot of shortcomings in the Partners app which is making things difficult.

• When are request comes in and you tap anywhere on the screen it will accept the request, this is not desirable because in India sometimes you have to see where the rider is placed because going inside small lanes is impossible for me in my car and I cant pan around the map to see rider location.
• The app is not intuative for example I accepted a rider on the way to work today, reached the pin and waited for quite a while and couldn't do anything because I cannot call the rider and there is no option to cancel either. So I had to begin and end the trip.
• Their route matching algorithm doesnt seem to be working too well.
• I've seen options to call/cancel before but it doesn't show up sometimes.

I waited for Renu for 10 minutes today, no call or nothing. Had to drive away to work.

I will continue using the app more and report, I they have done good improvements in terms of UI/UX on the rider side, but same needs to be done on the partner side as well because in India nobody checks the app notifications, its ultimately dependent on the partner calling the rider over the phone to co-ordinate which the partners app is making very difficult for some reason.

Originally Posted by shankar.balan

How are you managing the insurance part? As a private car owner, technically your insurance will not allow you to ply your vehicle for commercial purposes or for commercial gain either.

I really would want to know more about how this aspect is being handled.

You are technically correct, since the insurance contract says the car cannot be used for racing or commercial purpose. They can use this loophole to deny the claim, but there is no way they can prove the car was being used in Uber Pool either. So logically there is a grey area but risk exposure is minimal, maybe for me its bad since I've gotten a lot of press etc about this.

Originally Posted by shankar.balan

Will the insurance companies view it in quite the same light?
I always wonder about this - in the unfortunate event of an accident, will the Insurance company cough up what it is supposed to when very clearly, the activity being engaged in, is, strictly speaking, in contravention?

Insurance companies will try and haggle their way out anyways. So doesn't make a difference TBH. In India its your responsibility to have comprehensive coverage and not depend on 3rd party. Case in point an idiot in a beat up accord scratched my front left bumper the other day. Also recommend reading Zen and the Art of Motorcycle maintenance to be at peace with such things.

[tilt]

Originally Posted by quickdraw

*SNIP*You are technically correct, since the insurance contract says the car cannot be used for racing or commercial purpose. They can use this loophole to deny the claim, but there is no way they can prove the car was being used in Uber Pool either. So logically there is a grey area but risk exposure is minimal, maybe for me its bad since I've gotten a lot of press etc about this. *SNIP*

Bolding mine.

Well, insurance companies would easily get wise to such "shenanigans" and make it a routine point to ask Uber/Ola etc. if a certain car/owner is registered with them as a pool car/driver, and then use that to deny the claim.

Alternately, in today's world, everyone who has a database of users ultimately looks to see o whom they can sell said database and make money. Uber may very well (if not now, in the future) sell this database to insurance providers to facilitate their marketing departments to telemarket commercial policies to you.

Cheers

[akshaymahajan]

Originally Posted by quickdraw

I think there must be some issue with the date you've entered, why don't you get in touch with them, they should be able to help you out.



Thank you, appreciate it. Keep following me on twitter/fb I keep putting it up when I'll be driving UberPool.



My apologies that I forgot to add the link to the details of Uber Pool, you can find it at this link -

I will add it to the main post as-well.

So I did email them the same day. And today I get a one line email without any salutation saying

Yes you cannot register with 2007 Santro Xing .

Thanks.

A fortnight to write that seriously?

Anyways, will try to register my other car and try it atleast once!

[quickdraw]

Originally Posted by tilt

Alternately, in today's world, everyone who has a database of users ultimately looks to see o whom they can sell said database and make money. Uber may very well (if not now, in the future) sell this database to insurance providers to facilitate their marketing departments to telemarket commercial policies to you.

Uber is not going to destroy their brand reputation by selling customers or riders data with insurance companies. They have not much to gain and a lot to lose. Privacy is paramount for silicon valley startups and they will not do anything to jeopardize it and lose their home market which really cares about this, unlike India.

Originally Posted by akshaymahajan

Anyways, will try to register my other car and try it atleast once!

I'm sure they have their hands full, If I remember correctly the core UBER team is like 10-15 people.

[Turbanator]

You are technically correct, since the insurance contract says the car cannot be used for racing or commercial purpose. They can use this loophole to deny the claim, but there is no way they can prove the car was being used in Uber Pool either. So logically there is a grey area but risk exposure is minimal, maybe for me its bad since I've gotten a lot of press etc about this

This can be a matter of concern in my opinion , there are some threads even here on damages claimed by passengers / knowns travelling together with missing insurance - what happens if God forbid something goes wrong to anyone travelling with you ? Insurance guys can simply refuse and the liabilities can be huge

one such case

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/street...ed-advice.html

[quickdraw]

Originally Posted by Turbanator

This can be a matter of concern in my opinion , there are some threads even here on damages claimed by passengers / knowns travelling together with missing insurance - what happens if God forbid something goes wrong to anyone travelling with you ? Insurance guys can simply refuse and the liabilities can be huge

one such case

http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/street...ed-advice.html

Very true, I have messaged UBER and asked them to clarify this.

In other news, I've been riding the bike more and more to work which is a cause for other concern so have not gotten around ubering around too much. But UBER has been promoting this very hard for their riders, educating them on how pooling works and using their great designers to make the UI and UX smooth. They have also started heavily discounting UBER Pool so more people start using it

Uber is offering 40% off on UberGO rides using pool

I will be using it more often, and try and have reports regarding financials of this exercise and hopefully get an update on the insurance part as-well.

[vagabond128]

I received a mail from Uber yesterday, announcing launch of uberCOMMUTE in Bangalore. So now we have this service available in Bangalore as well.

I am yet to make up my mind on whether or not should I participate.