Industry First: Rapid Reporting to Provide Immediate, Real-Time Identity Verification

Social Security Administration releasing new technology, enabling Rapid Reporting to provide the industry with real-time identity verification service to dramatically reduce fraud at origination

Rapid Reporting, an award-winning innovator of income and identity verification products to the mortgage industry, has announced that DirectChek, the company’s identity verification service, will soon be providing instant verification of Social Security numbers (SSN) from the Social Security Administration (SSA). Immediate access to Social Security number verification data by the SSA has never before been available to the private sector.

By adding immediate Social Security number verification to the other “real time” components of DirectChek’s comprehensive identity report, Rapid Reporting is providing the mortgage industry with a stronger, better way to reduce fraud at origination. Rapid Reporting will lead the way in delivery of this ground-breaking turn-around time with instant, web-based access to a complete DirectChek identity report that can significantly elevate the value of identity verification and reduce the incidence of mortgage fraud.

“Immediate definitive identity verification is a huge step in fraud prevention,” states Jay Meadows, CEO of Rapid Reporting. “Statistics show that approximately six percent of all borrowers are not who they say they are. When a mortgage company can get an immediate definitive answer on the validity of a borrower’s identity, that company can know right away whether or not that transaction is worth pursuing. They won’t be forced to expend their time and resources on loans that will fall through later in the process, or worse, on loans that shouldn’t have been funded and end up costing them tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars in the future.”

In order to get instant identity verification, DirectChek users will simply input the borrower’s name, Social Security number and date of birth into the DirectChek system, and the system will provide an immediate answer.

The instant turn-around times are being made possible by the new technologies that the Social Security Administration is implementing to the new permanent consent-based program. Rapid Reporting has had strong and longstanding relationship with the government entity, and has had a positive impact on numerous program enhancements and improvements. Rapid Reporting was the first private company to establish a relationship with the SSA for the purpose of providing identity verification services to the private sector.

“Rapid Reporting is very proud to be a part of this ground-breaking change in fraud prevention,” adds Meadows. “Our clients rely on us to be on the leading edge of the industry, and it’s part of our mission to do just that. We’ve always been leaders, not followers. We’ve led the way with our definitive solutions, our relationships with government entities, and our lobbying efforts to further protect this industry from fraud. Now, we’re happy to be at the forefront once again with the industry’s most comprehensive identity report available in real time.”

Rapid Reporting’s instant identity verification services will be in effect on October 1, 2008, as the SSA’s real time program goes live.

About Rapid Reporting
Founded in 1998 and headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas, Rapid Reporting Verification Company is a national provider of definitive income and identity verification products for mortgage lenders to help combat fraud. In 2007, the company won the 2007 Fix-It Award for a technology solution that solves an industry problem. Core offerings include IncomeChek, which is used to verify income through information obtained from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), and DirectChek, which meets USA Patriot Act compliance and verifies identity via a direct comparison to the Social Security Administration (SSA) database and searches of over 15 billion records in public and private databases for identity fraud and abuse. Both products operate over a secure Web-based portal, which is audited daily for security purposes and are also available through RapidChek, the companies’ Web Services platform providing business to business connectivity for process automation and electronic data exchange. Rapid Reporting formed and continues to build relationships with government agencies, such as the IRS and the SSA, to gather electronic data for verification purposes. Rapid Reporting’s executive team led the successful lobbying efforts to secure the continuation of the enumeration verification system (EVS) with the SSA. For additional information, email info@rapidreporting.com, call 888.749.4411 or visit www.RapidReporting.com.