Your customers already come through the DM. Keep that.
KeyProof does not change how you get bookings. It starts the moment you have agreed one in Instagram or WhatsApp, and runs everything after: the driver check, your agreement, the deposit, the handover, the return, one record. One link, dropped into the chat you already use.
Private beta applications open, public launch January 2027The hirer pays their own £4.99 verification feeSet up with you by a founder
No firm has signed yet. KeyProof is choosing up to five UK hire firms for its private beta, set up and walked through their first real hire by a founder: request beta access.
KeyProof Ltd 17333773ICO ZC195906Own PI £1m + cyber £500k, Hiscox
One link into the chat you already use. It carries the whole check-in.
- You agree the hire in the DM
- Instagram, WhatsApp, a text, the way you already do it. Nothing moves off the chat, and you do not ask the customer to download an app or make an account. That part is working. KeyProof leaves it alone.
- You paste one link back
- It opens in the hirer’s browser on their own phone. That one link carries everything that has to happen before the keys change hands, in order, so nothing gets forgotten in a busy week.
- The driver verifies before they arrive
- Photo ID matched to a selfie, and a DVLA share code from the driver. What you read is the record the DVLA holds, not a photo of the card. Both done on the link, before the car is anywhere near them, so you are not deciding at the kerb with the engine running.
- Your agreement, e-signed, deposit held
- Your own hire terms, signed on the phone and hashed at the moment of signing so any later change is detectable. The deposit is held on your own Stripe. The money is yours; KeyProof never touches it.
- Handover and return, both ends recorded
- Timestamped condition photos when the car goes out and when it comes back, on the same link, so the state it left in sits next to the state it returned in. Provenance and timing, recorded. It does not judge fault, it holds the evidence you would otherwise be hunting for in a camera roll.
- One record when the hire is done
- Everything lands in one sealed record. If a hire goes wrong, that is what you hand an insurer, through a read-only link that expires, with no login for them. If a hire goes right, you never think about it again.
A chat and a spreadsheet works. Until a hire goes wrong.
| Capability | KeyProof | A chat thread and a spreadsheet |
|---|---|---|
| Where the booking happens | Your DMs, unchanged. | Your DMs. |
| Checking the driver is who they say | Photo ID matched to a selfie. | A photo of a licence in the chat, if you remember to ask. |
| Checking the licence is real and current | A DVLA share code; the answer comes from the DVLA. | Reading the card in the photo. |
| The hire agreement | Your terms, e-signed and hashed at signing. | Verbal, or a photo of a signed page. |
| The deposit | Held on your own Stripe. Released when you say, automatically after your grace period on a clean return, or by 6.5 days at the latest. | Cash, a transfer, or nothing. |
| Condition at handover and return | Timestamped photos at both ends, in one place. | Photos scattered across your camera roll. |
| What you hand an insurer | One record, a read-only link that expires, no login for them. | Screenshots you go hunting for. |
Plenty of firms run perfectly well on a chat and a spreadsheet, right up until a hire goes wrong. This is built for the day it does, without asking you to change the day it does not.
You keep how you get customers. KeyProof runs the part that goes wrong.
Moving to a booking platform means moving your customers onto it, and if your bookings genuinely live in DMs and that is working, that is a problem you do not have. KeyProof sits behind the chat instead of replacing it. And you do not have to set it up alone: send us your cars and your current hire agreement, and we will prepare it with you, so the first thing you do is send a hirer a link, not fill in a dashboard. KeyProof's private beta opens in November, being built with a founding cohort of UK hire firms rather than sold to them: how it works, the operator demo, and beta access.
What every hire leaves behind
IdentityPhoto ID matched to a selfie
LicenceDVLA share code, for your own check on gov.uk
ConditionTimestamped photos, both ends
AgreementE-signed, sealed with a hash
DepositLogged, traceable to the hirer
Keep the DM.
We’ll run the rest.
Send us your cars and your current agreement, and we’ll set it up with you.
KeyProof is selecting UK car hire operators for its private beta, ahead of public launch in January 2027.