PoolCircle - ride sharing service in Bangalore

We've reported that BlaBlaCar, an international car sharing service provider had developed keen interest in India. Eventually, it began operations in the country in January 2015. Based on a similar model, PoolCircle has been operating since 2013, based out of Bangalore. Pool Circle boasts of over 4,000 registered users with nearly 16,000 user activities per week.

It is a free to use, ride sharing network, available on web as well as iOS and android. Once registered, a user needs to set up one or more trips with the trip details - starting point, destination, time and whether they are looking for a car owner or a passenger. PoolCircle will find and display a list of other available matching users in the same area, after which, either user may contact the other for ride sharing.

A key challenge for the any ride sharing network in India, will be to persuade the users to use the application by instilling the requisite 'trust' in them. PoolCircle seems to have focused upon this aspect by introducing trust points. In other words, the more information a user shares about himself/herself, the more points they earn; this includes mobile phone number, profile picture, log in with social networking accounts as well as providing a corporate email ID.

Users can also select the connections or circles, they want to carpool with and each time they search for carpools on PoolCircle, they will only find those people in the search results.

In case of emergency, users can click a bell shaped icon on the app, which automatically sends their detailed location to 2 pre-saved contacts.

Apart from ride sharing, users can also learn more about public bus routes and timings.

Carpool can be a convenient and cost effective way to travel. Not only does it save users the headache of hiring a cab or autorickshaw, but also helps reduce congestion and pollution. To catch the discussion on carpooling click here.