Where do you find a carpool, and how do you know if you are compatible with the people you are riding with? What to look for when choosing a ride-sharing program.
Sharing space in a car is like sharing a house. You might not want to do it but the money you save makes up for the lack of freedom and flexibility. Who you choose to ride with makes all the difference between a tolerable journey to work or a mind-numbing altercation with someone whose very presence makes you rethink public transportation!
What You Need to Know Before You Join a Carpool:
- Find a ride-sharing program at your office. Before you search for carpools on sites like CarpoolConnect or ErideShare, make sure you check the bulletin board at work for others who live near you. That would be the most convenient and economical place to start. At least if they work for the same company, you don’t have to deal with total strangers.
- Find people who live and work near you. If you can’t find co-workers to share a ride with, make sure potential carpoolers live close enough to make the arrangement worthwhile. Ride sharing sites often allow you to type in the zip code where you live and the zip code where you work. Then they compile a list of people who match your criteria. But if you can only find people who live more than five miles from your house and more than 10 miles from where you work, the extra driving involved may not be cost effective.
- Do a background check on the people you ride with. Say you find two people to carpool with. If you don’t know them at all, get some references and do a check on their driving records. Make sure they work where they say they do, and check with your state’s division of motor vehicle records for a look at their history behind the wheel. You will need to get the driver’s permission before you can obtain his/her records.
- Find out about personal habits. If you are a huge country-western fan, but your passenger is more into hip hop and R & B. you might have a slight problem on your hands. Or worse, if the other person wears a noxious-smelling cologne or lights up a cigarette in the back seat, that might be a deal-breaker. Have a chat with your fellow carpoolers before you begin riding together. Make sure you can at least tolerate each other for the 20 minute drive to work. And don’t be afraid to set up ground rules, like no loud cell-phone conversations first thing in the morning, or no jammin’ to the oldies louder than 10 decibels. Just make sure this carpool arrangement is something you can live with, at least until you can find a better job to afford gas prices!
The copyright of the article Joining a Carpool in Consumer Education is owned by L. Marie Dubuque. Permission to republish Joining a Carpool in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
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