Thirdfort vs Stratum — how the per-call AML models differ
Thirdfort and Stratum / Certaby both target the same four ICPs — legal, conveyancing, estate agents, accountants — for AML + ID + Source-of-Funds + Know Your Business workflows. The two providers diverge sharply on pricing model, transparency, and bundling.
**Thirdfort's model**: per-industry pricing, displayed only after the buyer selects their industry on the pricing page (and historically only after a sales conversation). Multi-product subscription with ID + AML + sanctions + PEP + Source-of-Funds + KYB bundled. Strong document and biometric ID workflow including liveness detection. UK-built; widely adopted in conveyancing.
**Stratum / Certaby's model**: per-call API (£4.95 entry / £2.95 at 1000-pack on the Certaby letting-agent suite), no contract, no industry gate, full transparency at every volume tier. Bundles sanctions + PEP + adverse media + UBO walk + property-risk overlay (flood, radon, coal, contaminated land, knotweed, EPC, postcode crime) in the same audit-grade PDF. No biometric ID today (deferred per the W30 routing pending paying-customer signal). API-first surface for developer customers via Stratum APIs; non-developer surface via Certaby with form + bulk-CSV uploads.
**The structural choice for the buyer**: a low-volume firm running 50-500 checks per year typically pays less per-check on Stratum / Certaby's PAYG; a high-volume firm running 5,000+ per year may negotiate a better blended rate from Thirdfort once volume is in scope. The Source-of-Funds workflow is currently a Thirdfort win — Stratum's Open-Banking SoF integration is queued for post-paying-customer signal. The property-risk overlay is a Stratum win — Thirdfort does not ship environmental risk data on a compliance flow.
For conveyancers specifically, the workflow choice is also about deliverable shape. Thirdfort produces an aggregated compliance pack tailored to the firm's case-management system; Stratum / Certaby produces a hash-bound audit-grade PDF + a public verifier URL that proves the check was run on a specific date against specific list versions. The verifier URL is unique to Stratum / Certaby.
Source: Thirdfort Pricing
Last updated 2026-05-09.