5 Reasons Why You Should Use an ID Verification Solution

From renting scooters to purchasing alcohol, ID checks are part of daily life for many consumers. For businesses, the responsibility of making sure they’re staying compliant with the law in multiple locations can often take up a significant portion of their day and employee training. For some who put ID checks on the back-burner, getting caught serving minors or individuals with fake IDs can lead to them being shut down. And so-called “friendly fraud,” when a legitimate customer submits an untrue fraud claim, can be just as damaging.

ID verification is a key part of keeping businesses– and their customers– safe. And it’s more than just an employee checking an ID at the counter. With the continued digitization of many services, checking someone’s ID has become just as much of the consumer experience as the product they’re purchasing.

As you’re thinking about how to keep your business and customers safe, here are five key reasons to consider automating your ID check process with an ID verification solution:

1. Stay compliant with regulations more easily

Regulations for age-restricted goods like alcohol and transportation rentals vary from state to state and country to country. For businesses that have multiple locations in different areas, it can be difficult to ensure that your business is following the appropriate laws. 

A digital ID verification solution can help keep you compliant by automating this process, taking the responsibility off the hands of your employees. This process is different depending on the solution, but for an automated system like Berbix, a business could easily set up a workflow to accept or reject an ID above or below a certain age for different geographic locations:

2. Improve the customer experience

Whether consumers are purchasing cannabis, renting a scooter, or setting up an account to trade cryptocurrency, they expect a fast, seamless buying experience. And ID verification is a critical part of that. Waiting hours or days for their identity to get verified and their account approved is time that the potential customer isn’t spending purchasing with your business.

When the ID verification process happens in the checkout process is also important. Some ID verification solutions have a customer input their data in the beginning and only tell the customer if their ID was approved or denied until after they’ve completed checkout. This causes the customer to have to complete the entire process. Some solutions, however, don’t tell the customer if they were approved or not– and thus able to complete the transaction– until the next day.

The amount of time it takes to complete an ID verification isn’t an indicator of how secure or trustworthy that solution is. The best ID verification solutions are instant and automated– meaning the customer is immediately told if their ID was accepted or rejected without having to complete the transaction.

3. Protect against unconscious bias

In addition to improving the customer experience overall, an ID verification solution also helps protect customers and your business from decisions made as a result of unconscious bias. Automated ID verification solutions remove the human aspect from ID checks, decreasing the chance of ID acceptance or decline made due to bias on behalf of the employee. For example, an employee accepting an underage ID from a family member or rejecting an ID due to discrimination. And most ID verification solutions allow for human review of both rejected and accepted IDs. This gives an added layer of security for your business when it comes to checking ID.

4. Build credibility

Folks are entrusting your business to keep their personally identifiable information safe. If the only protection you have when creating an account or making a purchase is an email and password, more high-spending or security-conscious consumers may be less likely to do business with you. 

5. Deter fraud

Most importantly, ID verification solutions are one of the best ways to deter bad actors. It’s simply impossible to stay up-to-date on all of the latest types of fraud while still patching vulnerabilities. Even the largest businesses that are able to dedicate entire teams to combating fraud will still let some bad actors through.

An ID verification solution is key to fraud prevention because it helps to deter fraud caused by opportunistic individuals, leaving you time to focus on fraud caused by targeted attacks. Having the friction of an ID verification solution in place deters these would-be bad actors from attempting to purchase at your business. Their ID verification attempt will be logged in the ID verification solution, creating a paper trail that your business is then able to share with other locations or partners. In the case of “friendly fraud” mentioned earlier, it could also be helpful when fighting false fraudulent claims against your business.

And with an instant and automated ID verification solution, a would-be bad actor is immediately rejected, preventing the person from crowding your customer base.

Overall, the key with fraud protection is that no business will be 100 percent successful 100 percent of the time. But having an IDV solution in place is just enough friction to the sign up or buying process that it’ll deter many would-be fraudsters without turning away legitimate customers.

Running a business can be difficult, but checking customer IDs and verifying identities shouldn’t be. Leverage an automated and instant ID verification solution to handle ID checks so you and your employees can focus on what matters most. Check out Berbix and get started today.

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