A direct enquiry feels like a step down from a five-star Airbnb guest. The stars are the reassurance. They are also, as set out in why a five-star guest tells you almost nothing, the normal score. Hosts soften what they write because a blunt review is the expensive option. The number does not tell you who to let in.
What you can check, before the address goes out, is the person. That check is not a separate firm and not a weekend project. It is a step in the Stripe account you need anyway.
The account you already need
If you take a booking deposit, the card payment has to land somewhere. Stripe is the card firm behind that page. Open one account. The deposit and the balance go there.
You can opt to run the identity check through that same account. Stripe calls it Identity. You are not signing up to a second company, and you are not photographing passports on the doorstep. Switch it on once. After that it can sit in the booking, in the same flow as the deposit.
On a StayLocal booking, that is the point of putting it in the form. The guest pays the deposit, and the guest is sent to the Stripe check, without you emailing a link each time. StayLocal does not look at the passport. Stripe does. You read the result.
On a StayLocal booking, that is the point of putting it in the form. The guest pays you, and the guest is sent to the Stripe check, without you emailing a link each time. StayLocal does not look at the passport. Stripe does. You read the result.
What the guest does
They are on the phone they booked with. Stripe asks for a passport or a driving licence. The camera takes the document, then a selfie. Stripe’s own description is the bank-teller version: it looks at the document to see if it is real, then matches the face to the photo on it. The guest is asked to consent before the photos are used. If they close the page, they have not passed.
You do not get on a call. You do not squint at a WhatsApp picture. You get verified, or not verified, in the same account as the payment. No app for them to install. IDs from more than 100 countries are accepted, which covers the usual passport and a UK driving licence.
What it costs
Stripe’s UK Identity page lists the document-and-selfie check at £1.25 a completed verification. You are billed when the check finishes, not when someone opens the link and gives up. The £1.25 comes off the Stripe balance.
Forty bookings is £50. Airbnb’s single fee on those same bookings, at 15.5 per cent, is a different order of number. The worked sum, fee against that £1.25, is in what the commission buys.
The passport does not come to you
This is the part that puts owners off, and Stripe has already taken it. Their line is that they store the verification data for the business so it need not touch your systems. The scan does not have to land in your inbox, your phone photos, or a folder on the laptop. The guest has consented on Stripe’s page. If they later want the file deleted, that request goes to Stripe.
You take the result. Verified, or not. You are not building a drawer of driving licences.
The rule is the useful bit
A tick that arrives after you have sent the key code is a badge. The useful version is a rule. If the check does not come back verified, they do not get the address or the key code. The guest can pay the deposit and still not have the door.
That is the whole job. One Stripe account, because you needed it for the deposit. One switch, if you opt to use the check. The guest photographs the document. You read a line. £1.25. You can keep taking bookings on the platform. The five-star reviews are not a reason to keep paying the fee on the ones who already have your number.
The booking form is the one on the demo house, cottage.demo-sites.uk. The passport page the guest sees is Stripe’s.
Key sources
- Stripe Identity, UK page, stripe.com/gb/identity. ID document verification and selfie listed at £1.25 a completed verification. Stripe stores verification data so it need not touch the business’s systems. Users consent before data is shared. IDs from over 100 countries. Checked October 2026.
- Stripe Identity FAQ. Document check looks for a real or fake ID. Selfie check matches the face to the photo on the document. Compared by Stripe to a bank teller.
- Airbnb Help Centre, identity verification. A person-exists test. Not a behaviour score.