Speak to any customer who has had to go through verification checks, regardless of sector, and one of the biggest issues they will have encountered is the need for proof-of-funds checks.
For most people, the idea of someone reading the last three months of their bank statements feels very invasive. This is not a case of having anything to hide, but rather a case of privacy being breached.
The idea of a faceless stranger sifting through three months of your bank statements and then making a judgment call based on what they are reading is concerning. You are essentially providing a complete stranger with a 90-day window into your life and your spending habits, and for many people, this feels like quite a strong invasion of privacy.
Of course, like all compliance checks, proof-of-funds checks exist to protect customers. They are designed to ensure you are not going to get yourself into a difficult financial situation, such as gambling money you can’t afford or taking a loan you do not have the income to pay back. Most customers recognise the importance of this; it is the execution of it that raises concerns.
Invasion of Privacy
The biggest discomfort with proof of funds checks is that they reveal more than they need to. A compliance officer looking through your bank statements will have full access to everyone you have spent money with over the last three months.
This includes everything from the goodwill charity donations you made to the dating subscriptions you have and the political parties you donate to. Ultimately, none of this information is relevant to proving whether or not you have the funds to rent a property or to register with an online bookmaker.
Whether we like it or not, this level of insight can open the doors to unconscious bias. The person reading it may very well form opinions on a customer’s lifestyle, their spending priorities, and even their personal circumstances. While an experienced professional is unlikely to act on these, they still form a mental picture in a person’s head and could subconsciously influence what should be an objective verification.
It may also influence future interactions or decisions. Reading through someone’s bank statements will create a lasting image of that person, regardless of whether the document is kept on file or not.
A More Precise Approach
AI platforms like eyeDP’s remove this problem. It provides a cleaner, more precise alternative that deals exclusively with numbers. The platform will extract and verify the specific data points it needs to. It identifies the relevant financial transactions, searches for any anomalies or discrepancies, and verifies the document. What it won’t do is pass any judgment or create any sort of mental image of the person who is submitting it. Of course, the document will be kept on file, but the search and scan applications mean that there is no need to go through a user’s information with a fine-tooth comb.
This targeted approach is the perfect solution to the invasiveness of traditional checks. The AI has no concern about how you are spending your money at the weekend; it simply wants to ensure that the document is legitimate, the information you have provided is correct, and that you have access to the funds you need.
A Cleaner Future
While there is no denying that the three-month bank statement is one of the most effective ways to provide proof of funds, there is no reason why it needs to be as intrusive or as slow as it once was.
The shift to AI-powered verification isn’t about removing human oversight entirely; there will always be edge cases that require human judgment. It’s about deploying that human expertise where it adds value, and removing the sense of privacy being invaded by the customers.
Objective judgment is always going to be the aim when it comes to document verification and proof of funds checks, and our platform ensures that this is always the case.
