Verifying your account
As a regulated payments processing company, we are required to perform a number of know-your-customer (KYC) and anti-money laundering (AML) checks on all businesses and organisations using our service to collect payments from their clients.
First and foremost these checks are in place to keep ourselves, our customers, and those paying through GoCardless safe.
We aim to make this process as simple and unobtrusive as possible. In most cases, we are able to complete the checks using the information you enter into your online set up form. In some instances though, we will be required to ask for additional information and/or supporting documents to complete the checks. Please do bear with us if this is the case - we will do our best to ensure it’s as painless as possible.
Verifying your bank account
The verification payment is a requirement in order for us to verify that we are paying funds out to the same legal entity we are collecting on behalf of.
IMPORTANT: The bank account you enter must be registered in the same name as the legal entity you are collecting payments on behalf of; e.g. if your company is registered in the name "Example Company", your bank account must also be registered with the account holder name of "Example Company".
Generally, we can verify your payout bank account automatically when you make the verification payment, which you will be prompted to do after you add a payout bank account. However, in some situations, we may also request a bank statement.
1. Making a verification payment
Please note: We do not accept verification payments for USD, SEK, DKK and CAD. In the verification section of your onboarding form you won’t be asked to make a verification payment but will instead need to upload a statement. Please review the section below for more information on the type of documents we can accept.
Before GoCardless can send funds to your registered account, we need to verify that the bank account is owned by the same legal entity as we're collecting payments on behalf of. In order for successful verification payment please ensure that the payment is sent from the account of the entity signed up with GoCardless but not by the entity's representative, affiliated entities or associated individuals etc.
To do this, we ask that you transfer a minimum denomination payment from your registered bank account to GoCardless. You can see details of where to send this payment by clicking on the blue box within the Verify payout account section of your onboarding form. You will also receive an email that contains all of the details of the payment that you need to make, once you have connected your payout bank account.
Please use online banking to make the verification payment as you would a regular outgoing transfer. Please note that the verification payment is non-refundable.
Important: Please do not use other means (e.g. CHAPS, telephone banking, paying in a cheque at your bank etc.) to make the payment as we are unlikely to see all the required details on our statement if you make the payment this way.
It should take 1 business day to verify your bank account, providing the name registered to your bank account matches your business name.
If your verification is taking longer than 3 days, please contact us via this form, as there may be an issue with your verification payment.
2. Providing a bank statement
On occasion, our automated verification check fails, at which point we'll ask you to complete the check by providing a recent bank statement for the account you wish to receive funds into.
We will ask you to upload a recent bank statement to verify ownership of the bank account before we can settle any funds to it.
Documents we can accept:
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Bank statement
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Screenshot of your online bank account
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Bank account opening letter
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Official letter of proof from your bank (confirming the account holder name and account details)
The document will need to include your full bank account details, including the account name and the date (the document needs to be dated within the last 6 months). The document will need to be legible in its entirety (take care to avoid glare from the camera flash or cutting off part of the document) and will need to be in full colour.
If you are a limited company:
You will need to have a bank account held by the company. Your full company name should be listed as the account holder (please note, if the entity type is specified in your company name e.g. “Limited”, “Ltd”, “LLP”, etc. then this must also be included in the account holder name for us to be able to approve it).
If you are a sole trader:
Your bank account will need to show you or your trading name as the account holder. If you provide a document that shows your trading name, we will get in touch with you to clarify your entity type.
If you are a charity, sports club or other organisation:
Your bank account will need to be held in the name of the club/organisation. We will be unable to proceed if the bank account is held under an individual.