Veriff and Submittable: Leveraging the latest tech to safely and securely deliver financial aid to millions
Ensuring funds are delivered to financially distressed people and businesses is far from easy. With Veriff’s help, however, Submittable has been able to foil fraudsters and help successfully process millions of grant applications.
Chris Hooper
About Submittable
Submittable is a leading global social impact SaaS platform that empowers organizations across both the public and private sectors to launch, manage, and measure the results of large-scale social impact programs including grants, emergency relief, and corporate philanthropy.
The platform enables organizations to build and run any social impact application program to suit both their and their applicants’ needs. Submittable also allows organizations to accept any type of application, review it collaboratively, disburse funds and awards, track program progress and measure results – all from one dashboard.
Submittable was at the forefront of the public-sector response to Covid-19 and one of the many clients Submittable helped negotiate their way through this tricky period was the State of Montana. In this case, Submittable helped to distribute $1.25bn in CARES Act funding to those in desperate need – managing 5,000 applications daily across 18 emergency grant programs.
"We needed a genuine partner to support us in the massive volumes of grant applications that we process and Veriff provided that."
What business problems did Veriff solve for Submittable?
With multi-million-dollar emergency relief programs inviting applications from millions of businesses and individuals across the US, stakeholders need to know that every dollar is being delivered to a bone fide beneficiary.
Submittable’s clients also need to know that the online applications process is as inclusive, accessible and friction-free as possible, to ensure those who need it receive the financial relief they need.
Unfortunately, disaster relief programs supporting individuals in need routinely attract high levels of fraudulent activity, with individuals and criminal gangs probing conventional identity fraud protection measures in search of weaknesses they can exploit on an industrial scale. As Andy Wright, Submittable’s Chief Technology Officer, explained: “When government grant programs are announced it sounds to fraudsters like ‘free money, apply here’ and the incoming volume of applications is enough to create a distributed denial-of-service (DDOS) on most other systems. Veriff enables us to ensure applicants are who they say they are, in very little time and at this massive volume, so we can get financial assistance to the people who deserve it, rather than criminals.”
Submittable needed to transform its anti-fraud processes to meet the exacting demands of its clients. The company needed an identity verification solution capable of processing thousands of grant applications in a customer-centric manner, in real time, with a high level of accuracy and in a cost-effective manner. The solution also had to meet clients’ strict data management protocols.
“Veriff enables us to ensure applicants are who they say they are, in very little time and at massive volume, so we can get financial assistance to the people who deserve it, rather than criminals.”
What made the difference to Submittable when choosing Veriff?
“The ability to process thousands of grant applications daily was a crucial factor that made Veriff stand out from other vendors in the verification space,” Wright said.
“However, what really impressed us early on was Veriff’s ability to identify suspect documentation within seconds and escalate individual cases to its in-house fraud investigation teams. This second tier of human verification is baked into the Veriff solution, guaranteeing optimal cost efficiency, and ensuring there’s no hidden costs for users.
“Other vendors were either unable to provide this second-tier of human verification, or the solution they offered proved to be low quality and prohibitively expensive. We also found with other vendors that it was self-service and hands-off. We needed a genuine partner to support us in these massive volumes and Veriff provided that.”
Veriff’s approach also made a huge difference to Submittable’s time to value, enabling Submittable to reach the proof-of-concept stage within days of integrating the platform into its tech stack.
“The initial stages of implementation are easy and largely self-service,” Wright explained. “When our engineers did need solution support, Veriff’s response was super responsive. This included a dedicated Slack channel to provide swift and seamless communication, and rigorous load-testing before go-live, to ensure the platform could manage hundreds of simultaneous ID verification sessions.”
The Submittable team also praised Veriff’s ability to flex its data-management processes and procedures in order to meet its client’s requirements.
The biggest difference, however, was the way Veriff’s solution mitigated identity fraud. The solution not only ensures ID documents submitted by grant applicants are authentic, it also automates the process. With more than 11,000 government-issued documents on Veriff’s database, Veriff can authenticate documents from nearly every jurisdiction across the world. This means the Submittable team can now concentrate on their core mission – getting financial aid to those most in need.
"The initial stages of implementation are easy and largely self-service. When our engineers did need solution support, Veriff’s response was super responsive."
What was the immediate impact of implementing Veriff?
The biggest immediate impact was that Submittable was able to win major US-wide contracts by demonstrating they could effectively verify the identity of grant applicants and detect fraudulent submissions.
A good example was the State of Minnesota’s Frontline Worker Pay, which was signed into law on April 29, 2022, to provide emergency financial relief to workers within the state who had been on the frontlines during the COVID-19 crisis.
“We worked with Veriff to run the Frontline Worker Pay, or 'Hero Pay' program, with the State of Minnesota," said Wright. “Millions of people qualified for funds, and we were able to reduce fraudulent attempts to access those funds; which ultimately ensures that taxpayer funds are not getting lost due to fraud.”
Knowing the verification system works leaves the Submittable team free to concentrate on their primary goal – crafting highly effective social-impact programs which ensure the right individuals and organizations can easily access the financial support they are entitled to.
"A second tier of human verification is baked into the Veriff solution, guaranteeing optimal cost efficiency, and ensuring there’s no hidden costs for users."
About Veriff
Veriff is the preferred identity verification partner for the world’s biggest and best digital companies, including pioneers in fintech, crypto, gaming, and the mobility sectors. We provide advanced technology, deep insights, and expertise from our foundation in digital-first Estonia and honed in leading the digital identity revolution. The partner of choice for businesses who need to rapidly and effortlessly verify online users from anywhere in the world, Veriff delivers the widest possible identity document coverage.
By supporting government-issued IDs from more than 230 issuing countries and territories and with our intelligent decision engine, which analyzes thousands of technological and behavioral variables, Veriff enables trust from the first hello.
