Application Fee Payments

Original post

Good Morning!

Innago needs to implement the option for landlords to pay the tenant's application fees. Unfortunately, when you are dealing with rural individuals, a lot of the times they are a cash only system. Collecting money from the potential tenant, then sending them a screening is definitely needed.

Please implement this ASAP. this is a show stopper for me and I really don't want to find another platform. I love Innago.

Reply by Alex Toffler

Hey Nathaniel good morning!

We currently do not have the option for you to directly pay for the applicant's application like you are describing but I can pass this along to our product team to see what we can make available for situations like you're describing. The only way you could really do this currently is if you were sitting down with them while they complete it and then entered in your card number when the payment for the application is needed.

We have a couple of articles that explains why we currently operate this way too that I'll paste below. Most of the reasoning is due to potential legality issues.

https://help.innago.com/articles/how-can-i-pay-for-the-application-fee-on-behalf-of-an-applicant/

https://help.innago.com/articles/screening-laws-and-restrictions/

Feel free to reach out to me directly if you have any questions or anything as well.

alex@innago.com and 513-935-1495

Reply by Nathaniel Callahan

Understandable. Unfortunately, we are a 100% online, zero physical paper company. Appreciate you passing this along. This will be a show stopper for me moving forward, so I'm looking at alternatives. I know transunion already offers an application process for background checks and the landlord can pay on their behalf.

It would be good for Innago to implement this. Reimbursing is a good idea, the problem is when the applicants need to pay with cash (or prefer to).

Reply by Alex Toffler

I completely get that and let me see what the team says. I do see here the "Smart Move" offering from TransUnion where the landlord can pay for the applicant's application. Let me look more into this and see what is possible on our end.

Ideas/feedback like this is always very much appreciated!

Reply by Clifton Spann

Just remember, when the applicant pays for their own screening, it's a soft pull and will not hurt their credit rating. You can also keep Innago, but use another system for screening. Before Innago I used RentalApplication.net. The applicant had to sign a form and you would submit the form and payment. However, you as the landlord also had to submit to a periodic identity confirmation processes.