Blog / Safety

Sharing a long drive is one of the oldest and most sensible things travellers do. It halves the cost, it keeps a driver awake, and it turns four hours of nothing into four hours of company. It also means getting into a vehicle with someone you have never met, which is worth taking seriously rather than pretending otherwise.

What a verified licence actually proves

On imcomingg, anyone selling seats has had their driving licence checked by a person. That is genuinely useful — it proves the licence exists, is valid, is not expired, and carries the same name as the account. It means a real, identifiable, legally licensed person is behind the wheel.

Here is what it does not prove: that they are pleasant, honest, careful, sober, or safe to sit beside for four hours. No platform anywhere verifies that, whatever the badge on the profile implies. Treat a verified licence as the floor, not the ceiling.

Identity checks tell you who someone is. They do not tell you what someone is like. Only your own judgement does that, and you should keep using it the whole way.

The five habits that matter

1. Tell one person where you are going. Before you leave, send someone you trust the route, the date, the name on the listing and the journey code. It takes thirty seconds. If anything goes wrong, it is the single most useful thing that will exist.
2. Meet in public, in daylight. A petrol station, a mall entrance, a busy corner. Never a private address, never an underground car park, never somewhere you would not walk alone.
3. Keep the conversation on the platform. Do not move to a private number until after you have travelled together and you are comfortable. Once it leaves the thread, nothing is on record.
4. Check in when you arrive. One tap closes the loop for whoever was watching. Agree beforehand what they should do if you do not.
5. Leave if it feels wrong. Before the trip, at the meeting point, at a service station halfway. You do not owe a stranger a journey, an explanation, or a refund. Discomfort is a reason on its own.

Warning signs worth walking away from

If you are travelling alone

Listings can state a travellers preference — women travellers only, or men travellers only. If it makes you safer or more comfortable to set one on your own listing, set it. It appears on the listing and we ask people to respect it.

Be clear-eyed about what that is, though: it is a social protection, not an enforced one. We deliberately do not store anyone's gender on their account, so nothing on the platform can verify it. Use the preference as one signal among several, not as a guarantee — and keep the five habits above regardless.

For drivers

The risk runs both ways, and drivers forget that more often than passengers do. You are letting strangers into your vehicle, sometimes for hours, sometimes at night.

• Read the profile and the reviews before you accept anyone.
• Decline anyone you are not comfortable with. You never have to give a reason.
• Agree the price in writing before departure so there is nothing to argue about later.
• Keep valuables out of reach and out of sight, as you would anywhere.
• Check what your insurance actually covers. Carrying passengers for payment can change the policy you need, and driving without the right cover can void it entirely — including for the people in your back seat.

Who is responsible

A shared journey is a private arrangement between the people on it. imcomingg publishes the listing, verifies the licence, keeps the messages and gives you the safety tools — but we are not on the journey, we do not supervise it, and we are not responsible for what happens on it. If something goes wrong between travellers, that is between them and, if a crime may have occurred, the police.

We would rather say that plainly than bury it. If it is not the arrangement you want, book a normal ride instead — one verified driver, door to door, tracked the whole way.

The point of all this

None of the above is a reason not to share a journey. Millions of people do it every day without incident, and the ones who take these five habits seriously are the ones for whom it stays uneventful. Take the precautions, keep your judgement switched on, and enjoy the company.

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