INC FAQs: Location Features

The INC app uses Global Positioning System (GPS), WiFi information, travel bookings, mobile network routing information, and cellular base station information to determine the app’s location. The location is continuously uploaded to Insured Nomads servers, depending on internet access and location service settings on your device. The location is used to determine which alerts to send to your device. It can also be used to allow your Insured Nomads to locate you in case of emergencies. In order for the app to locate the user, the app works best when it can run freely in the background.
On iOS, this means that you should not “swipe-kill” the app since this will lead to more irregular location reports. Push notifications will however still work.
On Android, some models and apps shut down apps that run in the background or have not been opened for a few days, via so-called battery optimizers. Users should try to override these optimizations, since they would lead to locations not being reported, and push notifications will not be shown at all.

While having Service enabled, your app will send locations to Insured Nomads and you will also be eligible for alert notifications. If Service is disabled you will be invisible to the system and the system will not send or receive any information, unless the location data comes from a different source such as travel booking information.

It is not possible to see your location history and travel patterns. You can limit your positioning from exact positioning to country-level positioning through the “Privacy”-settings in the app.

Yes, go to the Privacy tab to disable “Exact Positioning”. This will send all future location reports on a country-level instead of sending your exact location. You will only receive alerts based on the country you are currently in.

Go to the Privacy tab and disable “Service”.

Note that the above action will disable receiving Alerts as well.

When the app is kept in the background, your location will be updated around once every hour. This will keep battery consumption at a relatively low level, but still, keep the app updated to make sure you receive relevant Alerts close to your location. The location will be updated more frequently if you are traveling or if you are using the app actively.

Note that to save battery, today’s mobile operating systems try their best to make sure apps do not run too much in the background. This might lead to irregularities in the location reporting, which is why we constantly adapt our services to avert these issues. Once you start moving or traveling, the app will normally send more frequent location reports again, compared to when the user stays around the same location.

The accuracy of location reporting mainly depends on whether the app can get proper satellite coverage. Problems might occur, either when being indoors or close to tall buildings. There are other factors that influence accuracy as each device’s GPS accuracy may differ.

Other apps might have better accuracy (down to a few meters) by enabling a constant GPS flow. However, these apps will drain your phone’s battery fairly quickly. Normally, INC gets an accuracy of around 100m to keep the battery consumption at a low level, and in order to ensure a good balance between accuracy and battery consumption.

While the phone is open for Wi-Fi networks, the location might be determined from a global database of Wi-Fi locations. These locations might not be accurate at all times, due to Wi-Fi access points being physically relocated, which may render the location obsolete. However, allowing Wi-Fi connections usually improve location data.

Your latest location sent to the servers will be shown, but no updates will be sent until the app goes online again.

The location accuracy will be most accurate when the phone has a clear view of the sky. While being indoors might not be perfect, the phone should in most cases get valid location information from a Wi-Fi or cellular network.

No, when the app is kept in the background it will only consume a minimal amount of battery.

Smart throttling dynamically adjusts the polling rate of an app user’s location by detecting whether the phone is stationary or in transit. If the phone is stationary, it does not update the location as frequently as when the phone is in transit, where frequent location updates are more eligible. Moreover, each time you open the app it will do a single shot, highly accurate, location request.

Risk Managers can only see an app user’s most recent report location, in the Web Portal. It is not possible to access an archive or log of your movements in the system due to privacy and data protection reasons.

Yes. This is done by disabling Exact positioning in the Privacy tab  in the app. This will make all future location reports only send country-level location. To reactivate it, simply enable the switch again.