In short: a full tenant reference verifies identity, credit, affordability, Right to Rent and rental history before you commit. Hello Neighbour references cost £30 per tenant and come back in 48 hours, with Open Banking and fraud checks built in.
Updated 21 September 2026
The key facts
In this article:
Because a bad tenant is now a longer problem than it used to be. The Renters' Rights Act 2025 abolished Section 21 on 1 May 2026, so a landlord who accepts the wrong applicant can no longer end the tenancy without establishing a ground for possession in court.
The risk on the way in has also risen. Goodlord's April 2024 analysis of more than 600,000 tenancy applications found detected fraud running at 1.2 cases per 1,000 applications in 2022 and 2.9 per 1,000 in 2023, a 140% increase in a single year. Forged or altered payslips accounted for 58% of the cases caught in 2023.
One caveat on that figure, because it matters for how much weight to put on it. Goodlord is measuring fraud its own referencing system detected, not fraud attempted across the whole market. The true attempt rate is unknowable and is certainly higher. What the number does establish is the direction, and the direction is the reason a reference has to look at the documents themselves rather than simply collect them.
Referencing reduces the risk of missed rent, property damage and disputes, and it covers the legal checks you are required to make. It is the one point in the process where a small amount of diligence is worth a great deal later.
Five checks: identity, credit, affordability, Right to Rent and rental history, with document verification running underneath all of them. Providers differ most on affordability, where Open Banking either is or is not part of the product, and on how far the fraud checking goes.
It is worth checking what your rent guarantee insurer requires before you commission a reference, because a policy can specify the standard of check it will accept. Ours meet the conditions of the main products.
We confirm identity using a certified ID service provider, with documents verified against official records. Our KYC and AML checks include Politically Exposed Person, sanctions and criminal watchlist screening, so you know exactly who you are letting to.
Our credit checks are powered by Experian and verify address history, credit performance and financial stability, including adverse history such as County Court Judgments.
We assess affordability through payslips, employment contracts and bank statements linked through Open Banking, which shows real income and spending across several months. Given that payslips were 58% of the fraud Goodlord detected in 2023, a check that reads the bank account rather than the document is doing materially different work.
We confirm employment directly, and we speak to previous landlords or agents whose feedback builds a fuller picture of how a tenant has treated properties and whether rent was paid on time. This is the part that most often surfaces something the documents do not.
Six checks run in sequence once an offer is accepted, and most of the information has already been gathered by then. Because referencing is built into our platform, details are collected in real time as the tenant moves through the viewing and offer process, so very little has to be requested from scratch at the end.
The sequence is:
There is more on where referencing sits in the wider letting process in our five-step guide to finding the right tenant. If you are handling the let end to end, the full guide to finding a tenant yourself sets out every stage from listing to move in.
48 hours for a Hello Neighbour reference, from the point the tenant completes their part. The variable is almost never the checking; it is how quickly an applicant supplies documents and how quickly a previous landlord or employer replies.
That is the argument for collecting information from the first enquiry onwards. A reference that starts from a standing set of verified details finishes in days. One that starts from nothing waits on other people, and the property stands empty while it does.
By examining how a document was made, not just what it says. We analyse editing history, fonts, metadata and production software, alongside the construction of the document itself, and compare those signals against what a genuine version of that document should look like.
A convincing forgery is easy to produce and hard to spot by eye, which is the whole difficulty. A payslip that reads correctly can still carry the metadata of the editing software used to alter it. Pairing that analysis with Open Banking is what closes the gap, because an altered payslip and a real bank feed disagree. There is more on the wider problem in Combatting letting fraud: keeping landlords safe.
A legal requirement in England to confirm that every adult occupier has the right to rent property in the UK, made before the tenancy begins. It does not apply in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland, or to certain accommodation such as student halls and holiday lets.
We carry out these checks through the Home Office online service. Where a tenant's right to rent is time limited, a follow-up check has to be completed before that period ends, and our management platform tracks those dates so the deadline is not missed.
We tell you immediately and explain why, and the decision on what to do next is yours. A failed reference is not automatically the end of an application.
In some cases a guarantor, a larger deposit within the permitted cap, or rent guarantee cover makes the risk acceptable. In others the reason for the failure is the answer in itself. We will talk you through which of those you are looking at.
£30 per tenant as an add-on through Get Reference, or included at no extra cost within Get Rented Pro. The same £30 applies to a guarantor.
We are able to hold that price because the checks run through our own platform on information already collected, instead of being commissioned as a separate job at the end of the process.
Because the checks run early, run consistently and include the two things that most often get left out: Open Banking affordability and document-level fraud analysis. Handling referencing yourself is possible, but it means chasing employers and previous landlords, assessing documents you have no way to verify, and carrying the Right to Rent obligation alone.
Records are stored securely and the legal checks are evidenced, which matters if a tenancy is ever disputed. If you would like us to handle the letting end to end, Get Rented Pro includes it.
Referencing is the last point at which a letting decision is cheap to change. Everything after it, from a missed payment to a possession claim under the new grounds, costs considerably more time and money than the check would have.
That balance has moved further since May 2026. With Section 21 gone and detected application fraud rising, the value of knowing who you are letting to, and of being able to show that you checked, is higher than it was. There is more on what else changed in our Renters' Rights Act hub.
Sources
Legislation
Renters' Rights Act 2025, tenancy reforms in force 1 May 2026.
Government
Home Office, Check a tenant's right to rent.
Sector
Goodlord, Referencing tenancy fraud spikes 140% in a year, April 2024, based on an analysis of over 600,000 tenancy applications across 2022 and 2023.
Ready to check your next tenant properly? Get a Reference for £30.