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Verify · Alternative data

Income & employment, verified at the source.

Real-time, user-permissioned income and employment data pulled directly from payroll systems, HR platforms, and gig apps — with automatic document fallback for applicants who can't connect an account. Either way, it's the alternative data lenders need to say yes to thin-file borrowers.

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Overview

Real-time income and employment verification, built for thin-file lending

Traditional credit scoring assumes a paper trail — payslips, tax returns, a credit bureau file. A large share of applicants don't have one, even though they're employed and earning. Smile's income and employment verification API closes that gap by connecting directly to the payroll systems, HR platforms, and gig apps applicants already use, turning consent-based account access into structured, decision-ready income data.

Not every applicant can connect a digital account, so Smile backs the API with a document-processing fallback: upload a payslip or tax document, and OCR extracts and verifies the same income and employment fields, with built-in checks for tampering and doctored numbers. Either path feeds the same profile inside Smile's Verify stage, so a lender gets one consistent income record regardless of how the data arrived.

Coverage varies by product: social-security data is available for Mexico and Thailand, and the account-linking network spans payroll, HR, and gig providers across Smile's supported markets.

What you get

Features

Direct account linking
A pre-built, secure widget connects to payroll systems, HR platforms, and gig economy apps, so applicants authorize access instead of uploading documents.
Continuous data sync
Once connected, income and employment data refreshes automatically — updated pay, a new employer, a changed status — until the applicant revokes access.
Document fallback (OCR)
When an applicant can't connect a digital account, they upload a payslip or tax document instead — OCR extracts income and employment fields automatically.
Document fraud detection
Uploaded documents are screened for tampering, computational inconsistencies, and other signs of doctoring before the data is trusted.
Structured, decision-ready output
Every verification returns clean, structured data that plugs directly into underwriting and credit models — no manual data entry.
Income estimator
Get an estimated monthly income range, income tier, and confidence from just an email address — a fast first look before the applicant connects an account.
Social security and income signals (MX, TH)
Where available, pull contribution and employment history from social-security data — employer, contribution days, and base amount in Mexico, plus income and job-change signals in Thailand.
Branded invitations
Invite applicants by email with your own sender name, landing page, and success page, then track each invite from sent to opened to linked.
Hosted link flow and forms
Run the connection flow on a Smile-hosted site that also captures your own form fields, and receive the completed session's combined payload by webhook.
Automatic document classification
Uploaded files are classified before extraction — payslip, tax document, employment certificate, bank statement, ID, or utility bill — so any document lands in the right pipeline.
Why it matters

Benefits

Underwrite thin-file applicants
Verified income and employment data gives lenders an alternative to bureau history, unlocking credit decisions for applicants who'd otherwise be declined for lack of a credit file.
Fewer stated-income risks
Source-verified income data replaces self-reported figures, reducing the risk of approving loans based on inflated income claims.
One vendor, two verification paths
Account linking and document processing run on the same API and profile, so product teams don't build and maintain two separate integrations.
Faster credit decisions
Structured, real-time data plugs straight into underwriting, cutting the time between application and decision from days to minutes.
FAQ

Common questions

What happens if an applicant can't connect their payroll or employment account?

Smile automatically falls back to document processing — the applicant uploads a payslip or tax document, and OCR extracts and verifies income and employment details, including checks for tampering or inconsistencies, so a lender still gets verified data even without a digital account connection.

Which payroll, HR, and gig platforms does Smile connect to?

Smile connects to a broad range of payroll systems, HR platforms, and gig economy apps through a single, pre-built integration, so a lender doesn't need to build or maintain separate connections to each provider.

How is income and employment data kept up to date after the initial check?

Where an applicant has connected an account, Smile can continuously sync income and employment data in the background until access is revoked, so a lender's records stay current without asking the applicant to re-verify.

Is income and employment data self-reported or verified at the source?

It's verified at the source — either pulled directly from a payroll or HR system the applicant has authorized, or extracted from an uploaded document and screened for tampering — rather than relying on a number the applicant types into a form.

Get connected

Ready to get connected?

Start with one capability or deploy the full lifecycle — Smile plugs into your existing onboarding and underwriting flows either way.

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