How Verification Works

South Africa has a serious pet-scam problem. The overwhelming majority of online pet sellers are unverified, and millions of rands are lost to fake breeders and stolen-photo listings every year. PetGuru's Trust Engine exists to change that.

Verification here is a ladder, not a gate. You sign up, and then you climb as far as you are comfortable. Each rung you reach shows buyers something specific, and nothing beyond the paperwork your trade legally needs is compulsory.

We deliberately do not ask for a photo of your ID or your face when you join. Handing those to a platform you have just met is a real risk, it stops honest sellers from signing up, and it barely inconveniences a scammer, who is perfectly capable of holding up a genuine ID. So the identity check starts with the 13-digit number you type, which we hash immediately, and the photo ID sits at the top of the ladder for sellers who choose it.

This page explains exactly what we check, what each level means, and how your information is protected.

1. The five levels

1. 1. Contact confirmed Confirm your email address and phone number.
2. 2. ID number on file Give us your SA ID number. We check it and keep only a one-way hash, never the number itself.
3. 3. Credentials confirmed Add your registration number or certificate (KUSA, SABBS, SAVC, NPO or CIPC).
4. 4. Independently corroborated Have someone outside PetGuru back you up: your vet, an official register, or Live Litter Proof on a litter. This is the one rung documents cannot earn, however many you send us.
5. 5. Photo ID confirmed Optional, and the biggest step: add your ID document and a selfie so we can match them. Only do this if you are comfortable.

The levels are counted, not chained. A breeder whose vet vouches for them but who has no kennel-body registration still earns that level, because requiring a strict order would shut out exactly the honest small sellers this platform exists for.

2. What each check actually is

Evidence falls into four groups. They answer different questions and are deliberately not interchangeable, which is why your badge names the specific thing we confirmed rather than showing a single vague seal.

2.1 Is the business real? (discovery)

Where a public register exists, we check it: the Department of Social Development NPO directory for shelters, CIPC company registrations for businesses, and the roll of active members and facilities the SAVC publishes monthly, which we import and match a vet's name against. CIPC numbers are also automatically format-validated. Pet stores, dog hotels, online stores and dog-friendly restaurants that are not CIPC-registered can instead verify as a sole proprietor: a bureau-checked SA ID number and a proof of address stand in for the certificate, restaurants also keep their health certificate on this path, and every sole-proprietor application is reviewed by a person.

South Africa publishes very few machine-checkable registers, and we would rather say so than imply a check we cannot run. KUSA and SABBS breeder numbers have no public lookup. The SAVC's published roll lists names but no registration numbers, so an SAVC number is still confirmed from the certificate and by manual review even when the name checks out. Numbers from the kennel bodies are confirmed the same way. Vets remain the one trade we also ask for an ID document, because veterinary practice is legally regulated and a fake vet is a direct animal-safety risk.

We also look for the business in open public sources: its own website, business listings, and public trading history. An AI agent runs that search, and every finding is recorded with the web address it came from, so a reviewer can check it and you can challenge it. Two independent sources must mention the business before it counts, and a hit on a consumer-complaint site stops it counting at all. The results always pass through a human reviewer, and an adverse finding is never published automatically: it goes to review, where you can contest it, or it is discarded.

2.2 Is this really you? (control)

This is the part a register check can't do. Anybody can type somebody else's registration number, so being listed on a register proves the business exists, not that the person holding the account is that business. To close that gap you prove you control something already tied to the business:

• Your website. If you have one, you add a short code we give you as a DNS record on your own domain. Free, instant, and nothing personal changes hands. Plenty of good breeders have no website at all, so this is an option rather than an expectation.
• Your social page. If your public presence lives on a social page rather than a website, you briefly publish a one-time code we issue on that page. Same idea as the DNS check: only the person who controls the page can do it.

2.3 Are the animals real and yours? (animals)

• Microchip. South Africa's chip registries offer no public lookup, and keeper data is POPIA-protected, so we do not check chip numbers against any registry and won't claim to. What actually happens with a chip number: if it appears on another PetGuru account or listing, both are flagged for human review (the same dog being sold twice is a classic scam), your vet can confirm the chip in one click while vouching for you, earning a "Microchip confirmed by their vet" badge, and our AI traces the number across the open web as a stolen- or cloned-listing signal. We look at the breeding animals first rather than the puppy, because puppies sell from eight weeks and are often not chipped yet, whereas a dam or sire usually is. Any buyer can also have a vet scan an animal and check the number independently.
• Your vet. You nominate your vet, we match their name against the roll of active members the SAVC publishes monthly and confirm their SAVC number from their certificate (the published roll carries no registration numbers), and they confirm you are a client of their practice with a single click, optionally confirming your animal's microchip at the same time. A professional with a licence to lose is a meaningful thing to stand behind you.
• Live Litter Proof. We issue a unique code; the breeder photographs the parent dog(s) and current litter with that code and the date handwritten on paper, plus a short kennel walkthrough. Because the code is freshly issued to that account, stolen or stock photos can't carry it.

2.4 Who is behind the account? (identity)

You type your 13-digit South African ID number. We validate it mathematically (checksum, date of birth, citizenship digit). We never store the number in plain text, only an irreversible cryptographic hash, which also lets us spot the same ID opening several accounts. Where an identity bureau becomes available to us, the number could additionally be confirmed against your name and date of birth; that check is not currently enabled, and we say so rather than imply it.

You are never asked for a photo of your ID when you sign up. The only exception is veterinarians and emergency clinics, whose trade is legally regulated and where a fake vet is a direct animal-safety risk.

2.5 The top level, which is yours to choose

Adding your ID document and a selfie is the fifth and highest level. We compare them one-to-one to confirm you are the ID holder, keep only the result, never build a facial database, and never show either publicly. Sellers who do this carry the highest verification level on their listings.

It is entirely optional and you can trade perfectly well without it. Do it only if you are comfortable.

There are a few moments where we will ask rather than offer: a large payout is about to be released to you, a high-value listing goes up from a brand-new account, or somebody has reported you. We tell you exactly why. If you have already confirmed your ID number and been independently corroborated, we don't ask at all, because the point is to close a real gap rather than to collect paperwork.

2.6 Address, images and behaviour

Business addresses are validated against mapping data to confirm a real physical premises rather than a PO box or an address that cannot be located. Every uploaded image is screened for inappropriate content, and applications are checked for behavioural red flags such as duplicate accounts, reused registration numbers, and suspicious timing.

3. AI plus human review

The results of every check feed a risk assessment that produces an overall score and recommendation. Independently earned confirmations lower the score: a register listing, control of the business's own domain, a vet who vouched for you. Missing optional paperwork does not raise it.

Low-risk applications can be approved automatically and clearly fraudulent ones declined, while anything in between goes to a member of our team. A hard failure is never auto-approved: an ID number that fails validation or is already in use on another account, a vet who declined to vouch, or a litter photo missing the code we issued.

A check we could not run is never treated as a check you failed. If a register has no data or a provider is unavailable, that is our limitation and it is recorded as "not checked".

If an application is declined, you can correct your information and resubmit, and the checks run again. AI assists our decision; it is never the final authority. You can read more in our AI Disclaimer.

4. What the badges mean (and don't)

Each badge names one specific thing we confirmed, "Registered with SAVC", "Confirmed by their vet", "Website confirmed", "Microchip confirmed by their vet", rather than a single seal implying we vouch for everything. On a seller's listing you can see the full list, when each was checked, and what each one actually proves.

A badge means a check passed at the point it was run. It is not a guarantee of the quality or health of an individual animal, of a clinical or service outcome, or of a professional's ongoing conduct or registration. Always ask questions, view animals and premises in person where you can, and confirm a professional's current registration with the relevant regulatory body. Never pay a deposit to someone who won't meet you or take a video call.

Breeders can verify without a kennel-body registration. A breeder who confirmed their KUSA, SABBS, or provincial registration shows that; a breeder who instead passed our Live Litter Proof and animal checks shows an Identity-Verified badge, so you can always tell the two apart. Both are real, checked breeders; the badge tells you which kind of proof we hold.

5. Your privacy & consent

Your SA ID number, and any facial image if you ever provide one, are "special personal information" under the Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA). We only process them with your explicit consent, asked for at the point of submission, and solely to verify identity and protect our community. The ID number is hashed immediately and never stored in plain text. Any documents or selfies are kept on access-controlled private storage, visible only to authorised reviewers, and are never shown on your public profile or to other users.

Collecting less is the point: the safest way to protect your identity data is for us not to hold it.

For full detail on what we collect, how it is processed (including by our third-party providers), how long we keep it, and how to withdraw consent or request deletion, see our Privacy Policy and POPIA Notice.

6. Ready to get verified?

If you're a breeder, shelter, or pet professional, you can start from your dashboard, or read more about becoming a verified breeder. Most sellers finish without uploading a single document. Buyers can always look for the badges on profiles and listings, and tap them to see exactly what was checked.