Legal

Privacy Policy

For customersFor drivers

Last updated 7 October 2026

1. About this policy

This policy explains how VANDOD BROTHERS LLP ("Vandod", "the LLP", "we", "us") handles your personal data. Our registered office is at 2593-5, CC 55, 1st Floor, Bose Nagar, Kadavanthara, Ernakulam, Kerala 682020. This policy covers the Vandod customer app, the Vandod driver app and our website, including the legal pages and the delete account page.

It is written to follow Indian law: the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 (DPDP Act), the Information Technology Act, 2000, and the Information Technology (Reasonable Security Practices and Procedures and Sensitive Personal Data or Information) Rules, 2011.

For the LLP, we are the "Data Fiduciary" under the DPDP Act: we decide why and how your data is used.

We describe our data practices in the data safety section of Google Play and in the privacy details of the Apple App Store. What we say there follows this policy.

"You" means anyone who uses the customer app or the driver app. Where a point applies only to customers or only to drivers, we say so.

2. What we collect

We collect only what we need to run the service. This is the full list.

For everyone

  • Phone number. We use it to sign you in with a one-time password (OTP), to identify your account, and so that a customer and a driver can reach each other about a trip. We do not ask for an email address to sign in.
  • Name. It is shown to the other person on a trip, and to our team.
  • Device and push token. This lets us send you notifications about your trips and account. Notifications are sent through the Expo push service.
  • App usage analytics. We record which screens you open and which buttons you tap, and link this to your account. We use it to find problems and to improve the app.
  • Support messages and photos. Anything you send us through Help, feedback or a report, including the trip you pick and any photos you attach.
  • Ratings and comments you give after a trip. Only Vandod admins can see them.
  • Payment status. Whether a trip has been marked as paid and confirmed. We do not see your bank, card or UPI PIN details, because you pay the driver directly.

Customers only

  • Saved cars: make, model, registration number, colour, gearbox type and fuel type.
  • Saved places and trip addresses: the pickup, drop and any stops of each trip, and the places you choose to save.
  • Live location. We use your location only when you use the app to set a pickup or look for nearby places. During a live trip the app shows the driver's position to you; that is the driver's location, not yours.

Drivers only

  • Driver details you give when you apply: your driving licence number and your city, and any documents we ask for, so that we can verify and approve you.
  • Live location. The app records your location continuously during an active trip. While you are online, it also records your location so that trips can be assigned to the nearest driver first. This happens only while the app is open on your phone (foreground). It does not run in the background.
  • Trip routes. The path your phone records during a trip. We keep it as a record for disputes and safety.
  • Odometer photo. Before a trip starts, you take a photo of the car's odometer (its kilometre reading). Only admins can see it. On earlier trips, a selfie and a vehicle photo may also have been taken.
  • Commission payment details. When you pay Vandod its commission, you enter a UPI transaction reference. We keep it, so that an admin can verify the payment.

We do not collect your contacts, your photo gallery (only photos you choose to send), your messages, or your location when the app is closed.

3. How we get your data

  • You give it to us: when you sign up, add a car or a place, book a trip, send us a message, or apply to be a driver.
  • The apps record it as you use them: location during a trip, routes, taps and screens, and your push token.
  • The other side of a trip can add it: a driver takes the handover photo of the odometer.
  • Our team may add notes to a trip or a support request while working on it.

4. Why we use your data

  • To create your account and sign you in.
  • To let customers book, and to assign, run and finish trips. This includes showing the driver to the customer and the trip details to the driver.
  • To assign trips: driver location helps us choose the nearest driver.
  • To keep trips safe and settle disputes, using the start PIN, the handover photo and the route.
  • To work out fares, and to record payments and driver commission, including verifying the commission a driver pays.
  • To answer support requests, reports and feedback.
  • To send notifications about a trip or your account.
  • To find and fix problems, prevent fraud and misuse, and improve the app.
  • To keep the accounts, tax and business records the law requires, and to respond to lawful requests from authorities.

We do not use your data for advertising and we do not sell it.

5. Our legal basis

We use your personal data:

  • with your consent. You give this when you accept this policy, and when you allow the app to use your location, camera or notifications. You can say no, or withdraw consent later, but parts of the service will not work without it (for example, a driver cannot take trips without sharing location);
  • for legitimate uses the DPDP Act allows without separate consent. Examples are doing what you asked (running the trip you booked), keeping records the law requires, responding to a legal request, and keeping people safe.

6. Who sees your data

Other people using Vandod

  • The assigned driver sees the customer's first name, the pickup, the drop, and the customer's phone number, for that trip.
  • The customer sees the driver's name, phone number and position on the map during the trip.

Vandod admins

  • Our admins see the data they need to assign drivers, run support, check commission payments and settle disputes. This can include trip details, routes and support messages.
  • The start photo can be opened by admins only.
  • Ratings and comments given after a trip can be seen by Vandod admins only. The other person on the trip does not see them.
  • So our team can act quickly, short alerts about new bookings, help requests, SOS alerts and new driver sign-ups are sent to a private Vandod admin group on Telegram. An alert can include your name, your phone number, the pickup place and, for an SOS, a map link to where you were. Only Vandod admins are in that group.

Service providers who help us run the app

  • Supabase provides our hosting and database.
  • WhatsApp (Meta) carries your sign-in code. We send it from a Vandod WhatsApp number to the number you enter, so Meta can see that a message was sent to your number. We also keep a short record of when a code was sent to a number, for about a week, to prevent misuse.
  • Expo provides the push notification service. It handles your push token and the notification message.
  • Google Maps and Google Places provide maps and address search. Addresses you type or places you look up may be sent to Google to show results.
  • Telegram carries the alerts to our admin group described above. Telegram stores those messages on its servers, which may be outside India.
  • Cloudflare Turnstile is a bot check that runs in the background when someone asks for a sign-in code, signs in as a guest, re-checks their identity to delete an account or logs in to the Vandod admin panel. It looks at signals from your device and browser, such as your IP address and how the page behaves, to tell a person from a bot, and it gives us a pass or fail result. Cloudflare handles that data under its Turnstile Privacy Addendum: https://www.cloudflare.com/turnstile-privacy-policy/

These providers handle data only to provide their service to us.

The law

  • We may share data with courts, police or other authorities when the law requires it, or to protect the safety of a person.

We do not sell your data and we do not show ads. We do not share your data with other businesses for their own marketing.

7. Location in detail

Location is the most sensitive data we use, so here is exactly how it works.

  • Customer app: asks for your location only to help you set a pickup or find places nearby. It is not tracked during a trip.
  • Driver app: records the location while you are online, so that the trip can be assigned to the nearest driver, and continuously during an active trip.
  • Only while the app is open: we do not track location in the background, and not when the app is closed.
  • Trip route: the driver's location points during a trip are saved as the route of that trip. We use them to settle disputes, for safety, and to meet legal obligations.
  • You can turn location off in your phone settings at any time. A driver cannot take trips without location.

8. Photos

A driver takes a photo of the car's odometer before each trip starts. It can be opened by admins only. We use it if there is a dispute, for example about distance or time. Customers and other drivers cannot see it.

If you attach photos to a support request, our team can see them. They are used to look into your request.

9. How long we keep data

  • Account details: when you ask to delete your account and it goes ahead, your personal details are removed 30 days after the request is confirmed, unless a trip or payment is still open.
  • Trip, payment and route records: we keep these without the link to your name or account. They are business records that we need for accounts, disputes, tax and legal obligations.
  • Support tickets: kept for up to 3 years after the ticket is closed, so we can deal with any follow-up.
  • Analytics: kept with your account while it is active. When your account is deleted, they are no longer linked to you.
  • Odometer photos (and selfies or vehicle photos from earlier trips) and routes: kept as part of the trip record for disputes, and without the link to your account after deletion.

We may keep data for longer if the law requires it, or if we need it for a dispute that is still open.

10. Keeping your data safe

We take reasonable steps to protect your data:

  • data is encrypted while it travels between your phone and our servers;
  • access is controlled by role, so people can see only what their work needs;
  • the start photo can be opened by admins only;
  • sign-in is by a one-time password sent to your phone on WhatsApp;
  • we ask our service providers to handle data only for the service they provide to us.

No system is perfectly secure. If there is a personal data breach that affects you, we will tell you and the authorities as the law requires.

You can help too. Do not share your OTP or your start PIN, and keep your phone locked.

11. Where your data is stored

Our database is hosted in India, in the Mumbai region. Some of our service providers may process limited data outside India. For example, Expo handles push tokens, Google handles map and address searches, Cloudflare runs the sign-in bot check, and Telegram carries alerts to our admin team. We use them only for those purposes. Under the DPDP Act, data may be transferred outside India unless the government restricts a country.

12. Children

Vandod is not for people under 18. We do not knowingly collect data from children. If you think a child has given us their data, please contact us and we will delete it.

13. Your rights

Under the DPDP Act you have the right to:

  • get a summary of the personal data we hold about you and how we use it;
  • ask us to correct data that is wrong or incomplete, or to update it;
  • ask us to erase your data;
  • withdraw your consent at any time;
  • get your complaint dealt with (see the Grievance Officer section);
  • complain to the Data Protection Board of India if we do not resolve your complaint;
  • nominate another person to use these rights for you if you die or cannot act.

How to use these rights:

  1. In the app, go to Account > Privacy and data. You can look at and edit your details there, and ask for your account to be deleted.
  2. Or contact our support team (see the "Contacting us" section) by phone, WhatsApp or email.

We may need to check that you are who you say you are before we act on a request. This is to protect your account.

14. Deleting your account

You can delete your account in the app under Account > Privacy and data > Delete account. If you cannot use the app, use the delete account page on our website.

  1. You send the request. There is a 30 day grace period.
  2. If you sign in again in that time and choose "Keep my account", the request is cancelled.
  3. If you do nothing, then after 30 days your account and personal details are removed.

What is removed: your name, phone number, saved cars, saved places, device and push details, and the link between your account and your app analytics. For drivers, the driver profile is also removed.

What we keep: trips, payments and routes, without your name or account link, as business records for accounts, disputes, tax and legal obligations.

What can stop deletion: a trip that is not finished, an open payment, or for drivers a commission that is unpaid or waiting to be verified. Once these are cleared, you can ask again.

15. Notifications

We send push notifications about your trips and your account, and replies from our support team. In the notification settings of the app you can choose which optional categories you receive; offers are off unless you turn them on. You can also turn notifications off in your phone settings. If you do, you may miss things like the arrival of your driver.

16. Grievance Officer

If you have a concern or complaint about how we handle your personal data, please contact our Grievance Officer, named here as the DPDP Act and the IT Rules require:

  • Name: Muhammed Shan K C
  • Designation: Grievance Officer
  • Email: admin@vandod.in
  • Phone: +91 88488 11812
  • Address: 2593-5, CC 55, 1st Floor, Bose Nagar, Kadavanthara, Ernakulam, Kerala 682020

We will acknowledge your complaint and try to resolve it within 15 days.

17. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy, for example when the app changes or the law changes. If we make an important change, we will tell you in the app. The date at the top shows when it was last updated. Using the app after a change means you accept the change, and where the law needs your consent again, we will ask for it.

18. Contacting us

The fastest way to reach us is the Help section in the app, where you can pick a trip and tell us what happened. You can also contact us directly:

  • Phone: +91 88488 11812
  • WhatsApp: +91 88488 11812
  • Email: admin@vandod.in
  • Support hours: 24 hours a day, every day
  • Registered office: 2593-5, CC 55, 1st Floor, Bose Nagar, Kadavanthara, Ernakulam, Kerala 682020