Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy explains how Zap Co. ("Zap", "we", "us") collects, uses, and shares information when you use the Zap platform — scheduled commute rides, Zap Now on-demand rides, package deliveries, and store orders — along with our website and the messages we send you. This page is maintained by Zap Co. and describes our own practices; it is not an independent certification or audit.

1. Information we collect

• Account information. Your name, email address, and phone number when you create a rider account, or when a Zap administrator creates a Zapper account for you.
• Profile photo. Riders and Zappers upload a profile photo so each party can identify the other at pickup. Photos are stored in a private bucket and are visible only to you, the counterpart on an active trip, and Zap administrators.
• Trip and address information. Pickup and drop-off addresses, saved addresses in your address book, weekly schedules, trip status history, ratings, and reviews.
• Location data. See section 3 below.
• Order information. For store orders: the merchant, the items and notes in your cart, the estimated total, the receipt total the Zapper submits, and a photo of the in-store receipt.
• Payment information. Card details are collected and stored by our payment processor (Stripe), not by Zap. We retain a payment token, the card brand and last four digits, charge amounts, authorization holds, pass purchases, and receipts.
• Messages. Messages you exchange with your Zapper or rider through in-app chat while a trip is active, plus notification records.
• Messages between riders. Messages you send to connected riders (including between Zap Kids and their guardians or approved friends, and in group chats) are stored so you can see your conversation history. They are encrypted in transit and at rest. Zap staff do not read them, except that a limited number of senior administrators may open a specific conversation for safety reasons, to respond to a legal request, or at the request of a Zap Kid's guardian. Every such access is recorded with the reason and time.
• Carpool matching. Off unless you turn it on in Zap Chat. When you and a connected rider have both turned it on, each of you can see that your upcoming Zaps line up — the day, the pickup time and the shared destination — so you can plan one ride together. It never includes Zap Kids.
• Friends of friends. With carpool matching on, you may also be matched with an adult who is connected to one of your connections and has turned matching on too. Each of you sees only the other's first name, which connection you share, the destination and roughly how close in time your Zaps are — never the exact time or where the other person starts. Either of you can ask; only the person asked is told, and they say yes or no. Your shared connection is never told and has no say. A yes lets the two of you add each other to a Zap Pool for 48 hours.
• Blocking and Community Guidelines. You can block anyone: it ends any connection between you, and neither of you sees the other's posts, Moments, Reels, map photos or comments, or can find or add the other. They aren't told. Before posting, commenting or sending photos, videos or messages, you agree to our Community Guidelines — no objectionable content and no abuse. Anything reported is hidden right away and reviewed by a person, and we remove content and accounts that break the guidelines.
• Usernames. Adults can choose a username so people can add them; it can also be used with your passcode to sign in. Someone who types your exact username sees your first name and photo so they can send a connection request — there's no searching by partial names, and Zap Kids never have one. Your Zap ID stays private: it's part of how you sign in.
• Tags in Zap Photos. You can tag your connections (never a Zap Kid) and a place in a photo. A tag shows a first name wherever the photo shows, and the person is told only if they can see it. Anyone tagged can take their tag off. You can't tag one of your saved addresses.
• Photos and videos in Zap Chat. Stored privately — never at a public link. Before anyone sees one, Zappy Guard checks it automatically using Google Cloud Vision (photos) or Video Intelligence (videos); anything it isn't sure about, or that someone reports, is held for a Zap safety reviewer to approve or remove. Viewing links last about a minute, and photos are hidden in screenshots and screen recordings. We record when a screenshot or recording happens while one is open. Photos and videos aren't available to Zap Kids yet.
• Child safety. When Zap removes a photo or video, we keep a fingerprint of it (not the file) so it can't be uploaded again. As US law requires, apparent child sexual abuse material is reported to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC), preserved for at least a year as the law requires, and the account's photos and videos are switched off.
• Zap Circuit posts. What you post — words, a photo or video, a place, or a Zap you took — is seen by the audience you choose: Public, Family or Friends. Posts never show a Zap's time, and you can't post one of your saved addresses. Zap Kids post only to the Zap Kids Circuit (connected kid friends, kids at the same school with the kids' feed on, and their guardian), never an address, and their posts disappear after 7 days. Reported posts are hidden until a Zap safety reviewer looks.
• Chatting with Zappy. What you write to Zappy — in Zap support or your private Zappy thread in Zap Chat — is sent to Google's Gemini AI so Zappy can understand it and answer, and is stored with your account so the conversation continues. Zappy acts only through Zap's own features, and asks for your clear yes before anything that spends money. Zap staff can read Zappy conversations to help you or keep Zap safe. Zappy chat in Zap Chat isn't available to Zap Kids.
• Zap Events. When you ask Zappy what's on nearby, Zap sends Ticketmaster a rounded location (about half a mile) and your search words — never your name or account — to list events. Buying tickets happens on Ticketmaster.
• Zap activity. Unless you turn it off, your connections can see your finished Zap Rides from the past week in Zap Chat — your first name, the place and the day. Never the time, and never a Zap to your home, work, school or any address you saved. You can hide any single Zap, or make all of it private. A Zap Kid's activity is seen only by their guardian and connected kid friends.
• Discover. “Loved by your friends” uses only what your connections already share with you (their posts and activity). The Zap Zone pulse counts how many different riders Zapped to businesses and places on the Zap Map this week — never who, never a home, and only when at least three riders did.
• Birthdays (Zap Gifts). Optional: the month and day of your birthday, never the year. Unless you turn sharing off, your connections see it coming up and may be reminded to Zap you a gift. A Zap Kid's birthday is added only by their guardian (month and day), is seen only by the connections that guardian approved, and the guardian can turn it off at any time.
• Zap Reels and Zap Trails. A public post with a video and a place can be found by that place on the Zap Map. Your Trail — the places of your Zaps and posts in the last 24 hours, in order, without times or saved addresses — is seen only by you unless you share it, and then only by the audience you pick. Zap Kids don't appear in Reels and can't share Trails.
• Zap Drops. A photo or video you drop in a chat, with a place and an invite, is checked by Zappy Guard like any chat photo. Each person sees it until they answer; once everyone has answered, or after 24 hours, the photo is deleted for good. Who's in is shared with the chat; who passed is shared only with you.
• Safety information. Emergency contacts you save, safety alerts you trigger, Zap ID verification records, and shared trip links you create.
• Technical information. Basic log and device data generated when you use the site, used to keep the service secure and working.

2. How we use information

• To match you with a Zapper and coordinate scheduled and on-demand jobs.
• To share the details a Zapper needs to complete your job — your name, photo, pickup and drop-off addresses, order contents, and scheduled times.
• To calculate routes, distances, traffic-aware ETAs, and upfront prices.
• To authorize, charge, refund, and receipt payments, and to issue single-use payment cards for in-store purchases made on your behalf.
• To send you service notifications in the app and by email — Zapper assigned, on the way, arrived, message received, trip completed, and schedule confirmations.
• To support you, prevent fraud and abuse, and comply with legal obligations.

3. Location data and live tracking

Zappers. When a Zapper turns on trip sharing for an active job, the Zap app reads their device's precise GPS location through the browser's location permission and streams it to Zap every few seconds. This is used to show the live map, keep pickup and delivery ETAs accurate, and offer nearby jobs to the closest available Zapper. Location sharing runs only while a job is active and stops when the job ends, when the Zapper turns it off, or when the Zapper denies or revokes the browser location permission. A Zapper can decline location sharing at any time from their device or browser settings; declining may limit the jobs offered to them.

Riders. Zap does not continuously track rider devices. We use the addresses you enter or select, and we show you the assigned Zapper's live position while your trip is in progress. Location pings older than a few minutes are treated as stale and are not shown.

Who can see it. A Zapper's live location during a job is visible to the rider on that job, to Zap administrators, and to anyone you give a shared trip link to. Shared trip links are unlisted URLs tied to a single trip and stop showing live data once the trip ends — treat them as sensitive and share only with people you trust.

Mapping provider. Addresses, coordinates, and route requests are sent to Google Maps Platform (geocoding, places autocomplete, and routing) to render maps and compute routes. Geocoding results are cached to reduce repeat lookups.

4. Payments and in-store purchases

Payments are processed by Stripe. Zap never stores your full card number. For rides, we charge the card on file automatically when the trip is completed. For store orders, we place an authorization hold covering the estimated items, store markup, delivery fee, and a variance buffer, then capture only the actual amount once the Zapper submits the in-store receipt; the unused portion of the hold is released. Zappers pay in store using a Zap-issued single-use virtual card with a spend limit — Zapper personal payment details are not involved, and card credentials are shown only to the assigned Zapper for that order.

5. Notifications

Zap sends transactional notifications — Zapper-arrival alerts, pickup confirmation requests, schedule reminders, message alerts, and trip summaries — to your Zap dashboard as in-app notifications and to the email address on your account. Zap does not send SMS text messages and does not send marketing notifications.

We do not share, sell, or provide your phone number, email address, location data, or notification data to third parties or affiliates for marketing or promotional purposes.

6. How we share information

We share information with the Zapper assigned to your job, with the people you send a shared trip link to, with service providers that operate the platform on our behalf, and when required by law or to protect the safety of riders and drivers. Our current service providers are our cloud application and database host, our email delivery provider, Stripe for payments and card issuing, and Google Maps Platform for mapping and routing. We do not sell your personal information.

7. Data retention and deletion

Trip history, receipts, and store order records are retained as business and tax records for as long as required. Zapper location pings are retained only briefly for live live tracking and trip reconstruction. Trip chat messages with your Zapper are tied to a single trip and are no longer accessible to either party once that trip ends. Account, schedule, and notification records are kept while your account is active and afterwards only as long as needed for legal, security, and record-keeping purposes. To request deletion of your account and associated data, contact us at the address below.

8. Your choices

You can review and update your name, phone number, photo, saved addresses, payment method, emergency contacts, and schedules at any time from your Zap dashboard. Zappers control location sharing from the trip screen and from their browser's location permission. You may also request access to, or deletion of, your personal information by contacting us.

9. Cookies and similar technologies

Zap uses cookies and browser storage that are necessary to keep you signed in and to keep the service secure. We do not use advertising or cross-site tracking cookies.

10. Security

Zap accounts are protected by email-and-password authentication with breached-password screening and email verification. Rider and Zapper records, photos, receipts, and messages are access-controlled so that only you, the counterpart on an active job, and Zap administrators can reach them. No system can be guaranteed to be perfectly secure, so please use a strong, unique password.

11. Children

Zap is not intended for anyone under 18, and we do not knowingly collect information from children.

12. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy from time to time. When we do, we will revise the "Last updated" date above and, where appropriate, notify you in the app.

13. Contact us

Zap Co. — privacy questions: thezapcompany@zapapp.app.