UK Startup Homeppl Debuts B2B Tenant Guarantor Service to Combat Tenancy Fraud

Homeppl, a London startup that works to create inclusion in property rentals, has rolled out a business-to-business (B2B) version of its tenant guarantor product, according to a Property Wire report Wednesday (April 6).

The product, called Homeppl Guarantid, was created in response to a rise in tenancy fraud over the past few years.

Tenancy fraud, along with the demand for guarantees from letting agents, landlords and Build to Rent properties, has been caused by an increased need to rent because of rising house prices alongside a housing shortage.

The newest data from Homeppl shows a rise in tenancy fraud since 2020, with a particularly sharp 75% rise from January to February this year. The two most common types of tenancy fraud are making fake financial documents and falsifying employment references.

The report also noted Homeppl thought the way to address this was through the development of Guarantid, which reportedly makes use of open banking, machine learning, instant decision engine, fraud detectioin tools and behavioral analysis, which should help rental guarantees.

Guarantid was a consumer product before, but it’s now also available for businesses, which will let it guarantee the rent of any tenant approved by the company, ensuring the full rental income.

PYMNTS wrote that the pandemic exposed some issues with the abilities of businesses to provide secure payment methods for B2B clients.

Read more: PYMNTS Intelligence: Modernizing the Digital Payments Process for B2B Clients

Consumer sites like Amazon and DoorDash have been gaining popularity, but B2B payments and purchases have lagged the consumer market in both automation and speed. The amount of global ventures and cross-border businesses has added new stakes and more of a need for B2B payments and streamlined associated processes.

A PYMNTS survey of financial institutions found that the pandemic only added to friction for B2B clients’ experience managing invoices and payments, with clients reporting problems like slow underwriting, general invoice reconciliation and working capital management processes.