Turning a compliance chore into a product
We turned a company-formation agent's in-house ID checks into a pay-as-you-go online service that accountants and other firms could use themselves.
The client
A company-formation agent, selling to accountants and other regulated firms.
The challenge
Money-laundering rules required our client to check the identity of the people behind every company it formed. Accountants and other regulated firms have the same duty, often without an easy way to carry it out. Our client already had the process; the opportunity was to sell it.
What we built
- An online checking service: register, buy credits, run a check and download a PDF report
- A free sample check, so firms could try it before buying
- Fair charging: no credit used if there was no match
- A staff area to manage customers, credits and checks
- The same checks built into the client's own ordering, with a compliance team's hold-and-release step before any work went ahead
Keeping it current
We later moved the service to a newer identity-data provider, adding risk assessments and ongoing alerts.
Technical details
Built as a credit-based order type inside the client's back office, with pages in its ASP.NET website. A separate client library wraps the identity provider's API: registration, personal and business risk assessments, alerts, billing data and PDF retrieval.
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