Getting Started with Car Sharing

Car sharing extends your fleet beyond scooters and e-bikes, letting you offer cars, vans, and other Smartcar-compatible vehicles through the same platform your customers already use. This guide walks you through everything you need to enable car sharing and get your first vehicles available for rental.

With car sharing enabled, your fleet gains:

Cloud-connected vehicles — lock, unlock, and track cars via Smartcar's API with no hardware installation
Structured rental sessions — a guided check-in and check-out flow with identity verification, insurance checks, condition documentation, and agreement signing
Advance reservations — customers can book vehicles hours, days, or weeks ahead
Flexible pricing — hourly, daily, weekly, and monthly rates with mileage and fuel surcharges
Subscription programs — offer Car-as-a-Service (CaaS) monthly plans with included mileage and vehicle swaps

Prerequisites

Before enabling car sharing, make sure you have:

Requirement	Details
Smartcar-compatible vehicles	Model year 2016 or newer from a supported brand
Car sharing plan	Contact your account manager to add car sharing to your subscription
Vehicle telematics accounts	Customers connect via their OEM account (e.g., Toyota Connected, FordPass)

Open Subaccount Settings

Navigate to Settings → Subaccount in the dashboard. Scroll to the Car Sharing section.

Enable Car Sharing

Toggle Car Sharing Enabled to on. This reveals the full configuration panel.

Enable Smartcar Integration

Toggle Smartcar Integration Enabled to on. This allows vehicles to be connected via Smartcar's OAuth flow.

Configure Requirements

Review each setting below and adjust to match your operational needs. The defaults are a good starting point for most operators.

Configuration Reference

The following settings control how car sharing operates for your fleet. All settings are configured under Settings → Subaccount → Car Sharing.

Rental Requirements

Setting	Default	Description
Require Insurance Verification	Off	Customers must verify active auto insurance before renting
Require Agreement Signature	On	Customers must sign the rental agreement during check-in
Require Condition Photos	On	Customers must take vehicle photos before and after each rental
Allow Manual Insurance Entry	On	Let customers manually enter policy details instead of using Axle verification

Photos & Documentation

Setting	Default	Description
Condition Photos Required Count	6	Number of photos required during check-in and check-out
Required Angles	Front, rear, driver side, passenger side, interior, odometer	Standard photo angles for condition documentation

Timeouts

Setting	Default	Description
Check-in Timeout	30 minutes	Time allowed to complete all check-in steps before the session expires
Check-out Timeout	60 minutes	Time allowed to complete all check-out steps before the session expires

Financial

Setting	Default	Description
Low Fuel Threshold	75%	Fuel level below which a low-fuel fee is charged on return
Low Fuel Fee	$45.00	Flat fee charged when vehicle is returned below the fuel threshold
Damage Deposit	$0.00	Refundable deposit held during the rental period

Start Simple

If you're launching car sharing for the first time, start with the defaults and adjust based on operational experience. You can always tighten requirements (like adding insurance verification or increasing photo counts) after your first few rentals.

Setup Checklist

Once car sharing is enabled, complete these steps to go live:

Connect your vehicles — Use the Smartcar integration to connect each car. See Connecting Vehicles with Smartcar.
Set up return zones — Define where customers can return vehicles. See Return Zones.
Configure rental agreements — Set up your rental agreement template and signing requirements. See Rental Agreements.
Set up insurance requirements — Choose whether insurance verification is required, optional, or disabled. See Insurance Verification.
Configure condition reports — Set photo requirements and enable AI damage detection. See Condition Reports.
Set pricing — Create pricing tiers for your vehicle models. See Car Sharing Pricing.
Set up violation handling — Configure how traffic tickets and toll charges are matched and charged to renters. See Violations & Tolls.
Enable reservations (optional) — Let customers book vehicles in advance. See Reservations & Bookings.
Configure fuel & mileage surcharges (optional) — Charge for fuel consumption or mileage overages. See Fuel & Mileage Surcharges.
Sync external calendars (optional) — Prevent double-bookings with Turo, Getaround, etc. See Calendar Sync.
Set vehicle availability (optional) — Block maintenance windows and set operating schedules. See Vehicle Availability.
Configure dynamic pricing (optional) — Set time-of-day and zone-based pricing rules. See Dynamic Pricing.
Set up CaaS plans (optional) — Offer monthly subscription programs. See Car-as-a-Service.
Define modification rules — Decide how extensions, early returns, and reschedules are handled. See Rental Extensions, Modifications, and Early Returns.
Prepare incident response — Define accident and roadside support playbooks before launch. See Accidents, Emergencies, and Roadside Assistance.
Document outage fallback — Train operators for Smartcar or OEM connectivity issues. See Smartcar Outage Runbook.
Set EV return policies (if applicable) — Standardize charging expectations and idle fees. See EV Charging, Return Rules, and Reimbursement.
Configure integrations (optional) — Subscribe to API events for operations and analytics. See Car Sharing API & Webhooks.

What's Next

Once your vehicles are connected and your settings are configured, customers can begin renting cars through the mobile app. The Rental Session Flow article explains the complete check-in → rental → check-out lifecycle that customers experience.

Need Help?

If you have questions about enabling car sharing or need help with configuration, contact us at support@levyelectric.com.