#dpelkey98
lament yoke
calm berry
Looking in to the benefits API wise. We do not know anything about product costs on this server so that question is a better one for our support team https://support.stripe.com/?contact=true
blissful topaz
Okay, will reach out for cost, but definitely interested in benefit of using Identity over the API. The obvious consideration being that the API is free..
calm berry
Apologies for the delay, the server has been busy so I haven't gotten much time to look in to this. Consulting my colleagues and will let you know what we can find
timber sentinel
If you're using Custom accounts you have the option of using the API directly. The benefit of Stripe Identity is that you don't have to build an equivalent offering yourself. This can be quite a lot of work even for a single jurisdiction (eg, USA) and consistent business structure for your accounts (eg, individuals). The work quickly grows when you need to support a variety of business types and regions (different required information) and want to offer localization.
Because this is something every platform has to deal with, we built Connect onboarding to offer an easier option to help platforms offload that entire pillar of work.
Large mature platforms (or ones with really specific experience goals) can choose to implement such a flow themselves, but I really don't recommend it.
blissful topaz
So in my case, we are going the completely custom route. Avoiding the Stripe-provided onboarding interface completely. I've been using the stripe-react-native sdk to provide some of this. However, when it comes to identity, we are currently only concerned with individuals and not other businesses.
That being said, would it still be worth using the Identity platform to simply upload an ID card here and there? I am also still a little confused on the purpose of the "verification session"
Am I wrong in assuming that uploading an ID document photo that a user takes directly to the Stripe API will have the same exact effect in terms of identity verification? Regardless of localization?
blissful topaz
Apologies for the delay, the server has been busy so I haven't gotten much time ...
No need to apologize! I appreciate both of you for helping.
timber sentinel
So in my case, we are going the completely custom route. Avoiding the Stripe-pro...
That's really up to you -- Identity is a standalone API when you want to do identity verifications outside the context of an account onboarding. Some things are common/shared between Connect onboarding if I recall, but they are mostly separate.
timber sentinel
Am I wrong in assuming that uploading an ID document photo that a user takes dir...
No that's roughly correct, its ~equivalent to capture the image yourself and send it via the API vs sending the user to Connect Onboarding to upload through our hosted surface.
You can certainly take a mixed approach if you wanted, collecting the text-based data in your own UI but if document verification is needed then you can push the user to Connect Onboarding to avoid building that part.
blissful topaz
Oh, I see. Yeah, right now I am just trying to satisfy connect account requirements as they arise. So, Identity can be used for this purpose, as well as some type of platform independent fraud prevention?
timber sentinel
Mostly I don't think you want Identity here if you're onboarding accounts, so I'm referring to hosted Connect Onboarding specifcally.
If you have separate identity verification needs outside of onboarding you can certainly use Identity if you like
blissful topaz
Gotcha, that makes more sense. Thank you very much for your help!
timber sentinel
NP!