Last week the MyIdentity Trust Scheme announced trials in 11 locations of a new one-time digital identity system. Under the scheme,  home buyers and sellers should no longer be repeatedly asked to provide their identity details to all the parties involved in the chain of transactions.

Estate agents, licensed conveyancers, solicitors and mortgage intermediaries operating in Battersea, Chiswick, Clapham, Putney, Wimbledon, Richmond, Kew, Cheltenham, Gloucester, Harrogate and York will be the first to take part in the trials which will start in October this year. Further areas will be added next year.

Etive, the company delivering the trust scheme says the move means quicker completions and more control over how consumers share their identity details and who they share their identity details with.

Stuart Young, Director of Etive Limited,  said: “We are really pleased that the residential property industry has come together on this to work and improve such an important aspect of the home buying and selling process”.

“Working with MHCLG and DCMS, as well as all the necessary regulators and representative bodies, we expect to be in a position to run real live customers and transactions through the new scheme from October of this year.”

EYE asked the firm on what basis the statement about quicker completions was made and whether there is any evidence to show that the current system of identity checking multiple times in the process is leading to delay in completions.

Stuart Young told us:

“This stems from industry issues raised over many years around the problems of the high friction caused by the number of identity checks consumers have to go through, and the delays and extra costs incurred by consumers.

“The MHCLG consultation on improving the home buying & selling process also highlights the issue of identity checking to help speed up the process, as well as to better tackle property and mortgage fraud.

“Consumer research carried out by Hunters EA earlier this year of consumers going the through the home buying and selling process overwhelmingly highlighted their frustration of the identity checking part of the process, with feedback such as: ‘Buying/selling a property is a marathon in itself, having to provide the same info multiple times to different parties, so anything to speed up or minimise this process would be a massive step forward.’ and, ‘With increasing amounts of ID verification being difficult to access, eg many people no longer have paper utility bills, one digital identity would be a great solution‘ and, ‘ID checks are currently a joke, I have provided 12 different forms of ID and problems with them all.’

Covid has obviously accelerated the need for improved and quicker digital identity verification plus the ability for the consumer to only have to do it once, to a higher standard based on Government backed standards.”

So, whilst there is little doubt that the scheme will almost certainly make life easier for all concerned by potentially doing away with multiple identity checks, as yet there appears to be little hard evidence that this part of the transaction process delays completions – or, via the new scheme, will contribute to making them quicker.

What do you think? Have you had experience of identity checking holding up a transaction or a completion?

The following organisations are assisting the MyIdentity trial project: Association of Mortgage Intermediaries, Bold Legal Group, Building Societies Association, Cifas, CILEx Regulation, Council for Licensed Conveyancers, Conveyancing Association, Guild of Property Professionals, Home Buying & Selling Group, HM Land Registry, Home Builders Federation, Intermediary Mortgage Lenders Association, the Law Society of England and Wales, National Trading
Standards Estate & Letting Agency Team, Propertymark, RICS, RPSA, Society of Licensed Conveyancers, Solicitors Regulation Authority and UK Finance.