FIIDO / PopuTrust Competitive Battlecard
Annual firm spend, product coverage, organization scale and operating-efficiency comparisons.
8 organizations40 comparison rowsUSD annual estimates
Model—not an invoice quote. FINRA, FCA and ASIC charges depend on regulated revenue, permissions, activities, registered personnel, branches and transaction volume. Screening-company spend depends on hiring volume and package depth. Estimates below use a representative financial-services firm, approximately 25% annual hiring/turnover, mid-to-comprehensive screening, and no extraordinary enforcement, application, trading-activity or special-project charges.
| Comparison row | PopuTrust / FIIDO | BrokerCheck / FINRA | Checkr | GoodHire | Sterling | HireRight | FCA — United Kingdom | ASIC — Australia |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Annual firm spend | Best estimate by organization size | |||||||
| 1. Solo professional | $499Verified professional / micro-firm membership | $1,410Minimum GIA + one registered person | $95One comprehensive report | $95 | $150Estimated minimum order | $120 | $2,700Approx. £2,000 minimum FCA fee | $2,000Indicative levy + entity fees |
| 2. Up to 5-person firm | $1,500 | $3,100 | $190 | $200 | $500 | $400 | $6,000 | $5,000 |
| 3. Up to 20-person firm | $5,000 | $14,000 | $570 | $600 | $1,800 | $1,500 | $18,000 | $15,000 |
| 4. Up to 100-person firm | $10,000 | $80,000 | $2,250 | $2,375 | $7,500 | $6,500 | $75,000 | $60,000 |
| 5. Up to 500-person firm | $25,000 | $293,000 | $9,375 | $10,000 | $35,000 | $30,000 | $300,000 | $250,000 |
| 6. 500+ person firm | $50,000 | $420,000 | $13,300 | $14,500 | $55,000 | $50,000 | $500,000 | $400,000 |
| 7. 1,000+ person firm | $100,000 | $550,000 | $16,250 | $18,000 | $85,000 | $75,000 | $800,000 | $700,000 |
| 8. 2,500+ person firm | $250,000 | $1,050,000 | $34,375 | $40,000 | $200,000 | $180,000 | $1,800,000 | $1,500,000 |
| Battlecard detail | How the buyer understands each offering | |||||||
| 9. Pricing basis | Annual membership level, verification depth, countries, people and firm complexity | Gross revenue, registered personnel, branches and trading activity | Per report; enterprise volume quote | Per report; custom pricing above 50 checks/year | Custom enterprise package and report volume | Custom package, geography and report volume | Permissions, fee blocks, annual income and other tariff data | Regulated subsector, activity metrics, levies and service fees |
| 10. What the firm pays for | Public trust profile, verified people, verified firm, credential evidence, monitoring and membership badge | Mandatory U.S. broker-dealer supervision and regulation | Candidate and workforce screening | Candidate and workforce screening | Global workforce screening and compliance workflow | Global workforce screening and compliance workflow | Mandatory U.K. financial-services authorization and supervision | Australian corporate registration and regulated-industry supervision |
| 11. Public person profile | Core product — cross-source identity, employment, affiliations, geography, licensing and risk | Yes, regulated individuals only | Candidate report, not broad public intelligence | Candidate report | Candidate report | Candidate report | Financial Services Register entries | Professional and banned/disqualified registers |
| 12. Public firm profile | Core product — history, owners, officers, affiliations, licenses, risk and source links | Member firm and regulatory records | Not primary | Not primary | Not primary | Not primary | Authorized-firm register | Company and regulated-entity registers |
| 13. Membership / trust badge | Yes — FIIDO Member / FIIDO Verified | FINRA membership is regulatory status, not a marketing accreditation | No comparable firm-membership badge | No comparable firm-membership badge | No comparable firm-membership badge | No comparable firm-membership badge | Authorized status, not voluntary accreditation | Registered/authorized status |
| 14. Licensing / regulatory depth | Aggregates regulators globally and normalizes country differences | Deep U.S. broker-dealer data | License verification add-on | Available in screening packages | Available by package/country | Available by package/country | Deep U.K. financial authorization data | Deep Australian corporate/regulatory data |
| 15. Employment screening | Supported within broader intelligence and verification product | Not primary | Core product | Core product | Core product | Core product | Not a screening vendor | Not a screening vendor |
| 16. International coverage | Global-by-design; common person/firm schema | Primarily United States | 200+ countries/territories advertised | International options via screening network | Global enterprise coverage | Global enterprise coverage | United Kingdom jurisdiction | Australia jurisdiction |
| 17. Human review | Tiered human review, analyst reports and bespoke investigations | Regulatory review and examination | Operational review within screening process | Operational review within screening process | Enterprise analyst/operations support | Enterprise analyst/operations support | Supervisory and enforcement review | Supervisory and enforcement review |
| 18. Ongoing monitoring | Membership renewal, source recency, alerts and profile monitoring | Continuous regulatory supervision | Continuous criminal monitoring available | Available depending on package | Available in enterprise programs | Available in enterprise programs | Continuous regulatory supervision | Ongoing regulatory and registration obligations |
| 19. Primary budget attacked | Membership, regulatory, compliance, risk, licensing, due diligence and trust | Mandatory regulatory membership | HR / talent acquisition / compliance | HR / talent acquisition | HR / global workforce risk | HR / global workforce risk | Mandatory regulatory authorization | Mandatory registration and regulatory levies |
| 20. 20-year spend at 100-person scale | $200,000Nominal; $10k/year | $1.60MBefore trading/activity growth | $45,000 | $47,500 | $150,000 | $130,000 | $1.50M | $1.20M |
| Organization profile | High-level operating characteristics | |||||||
| 21. Founded / established | 2026 operating relaunch | FINRA 2007; BrokerCheck predecessor records earlier | 2014 | 2013 | 1975 | 1981 | 2013 | 1998 |
| 22. Organization type | Private company + voluntary membership and verification framework | U.S. self-regulatory organization | Private background-screening company | Private background-screening company | Private background-screening company | Public background-screening company | U.K. statutory regulator | Australian statutory regulator |
| 23. Primary customer | Financial firms, employers, professionals, investigators and consumers | U.S. broker-dealers and registered personnel | Employers and platforms | Small and midsize employers | Enterprise employers | Enterprise employers | U.K. regulated financial firms | Australian companies and regulated firms |
| 24. Primary geography | Global | United States | Global | Primarily United States | Global | Global | United Kingdom | Australia |
| 25. Public people search | Yes — central product | Yes, regulated financial professionals | No public directory | No public directory | No public directory | No public directory | Yes, approved/certified persons | Selected professional registers |
| 26. Public company search | Yes — central product | Yes, regulated firms | No | No | No | No | Yes, authorized firms | Yes, company and professional registers |
| 27. API / integrations | Core API, white-label and workflow product | Public data and limited interfaces | Core enterprise API | Partner integrations | Enterprise integrations | Enterprise integrations | Public register/data interfaces | Public register/data services |
| 28. Human investigation | Tiered human review from profile validation through bespoke diligence | Regulatory examination and enforcement only | Operational review and dispute handling | Operational review and dispute handling | Enterprise analyst services | Enterprise analyst services | Supervision and enforcement | Supervision and enforcement |
| 29. Membership / trust mark | FIIDO Member / FIIDO Verified badge | Mandatory membership status for broker-dealers | No equivalent | No equivalent | No equivalent | No equivalent | Authorization status, not voluntary accreditation | Registration/authorization status |
| 30. Revenue model | Membership + reports + monitoring + API + investigations | Assessments, registrations, activity and other regulatory fees | Per report + enterprise subscriptions | Per report + volume plans | Enterprise contracts | Enterprise contracts | Regulatory fees and levies | Government appropriations, fees and industry levies |
| Efficiency & scale | High-level public metrics and modeled efficiency indicators; estimates are labeled | |||||||
| 31. Estimated employees | Launch: 5–20; scale target: 100+ | ~4,000 | ~1,000–1,500 | Included within Checkr after acquisition | ~6,000–8,000 | ~3,000–4,000 | ~5,000 | ~1,800–2,000 |
| 32. Annual revenue / income | Modeled membership revenue by adoption | ~$1.5B regulatory revenue | Company reported more than $800M gross revenue in 2025 | Not separately disclosed | Estimated $700M–$1.0B | Approximately $700M–$800M | Implied operating income near £778M from published benefit/spend ratio | Estimated A$800M–A$1.0B total funding |
| 33. Annual operating budget | Lean target: 35%–55% of recurring revenue | ~$1.4B–$1.6B | Not publicly disclosed; estimated $500M–$750M | Not separately disclosed | Estimated $600M–$850M | Estimated $600M–$750M | ~£778M implied | Estimated A$800M–A$1.0B |
| 34. Firms / customers served | Goal: 1,000 early financial members, then global expansion | ~3,200 member firms | 120,000+ customers reported | Part of Checkr customer base | 50,000+ organizations often cited | 40,000+ organizations often cited | ~41,000 regulated firms | Millions of registered companies; thousands of regulated licensees |
| 35. People / checks / profiles annually | Profiles monitored continuously; analyst review only when triggered or purchased | ~600,000+ registered representatives plus applicants and disclosures | Millions of trust decisions monthly | Included in Checkr volume | Tens of millions of checks globally, estimated | Tens of millions of checks globally, estimated | Hundreds of thousands of approved/certified persons and applications | Millions of registry records; targeted regulatory reviews |
| 36. Complaints / tips / disputes | Member challenges, correction requests, risk alerts and report disputes | Tens of thousands of complaints, tips, disclosures and referrals annually | Consumer disputes are a small fraction of completed checks; exact total not disclosed | Not separately disclosed | Not publicly disclosed | Not publicly disclosed | Whistleblowing, consumer contacts and supervisory referrals; 1,375 whistleblowing reports in 2025/26 | 19,000+ misconduct reports annualized from 2025 H2 rate |
| 37. Matters receiving deeper human review | Risk-ranked: only disputed, high-risk, paid or randomly audited profiles | Far fewer than total registrations/disclosures; exact comparable count not published | Exception, dispute and adverse-action cases | Exception and dispute cases | Exception, adjudication and enterprise-review cases | Exception, adjudication and enterprise-review cases | 127 open enforcement operations at 31 March 2026, plus supervisory/intervention cases | About 17% of 2025 H2 misconduct reports prioritized for further assessment |
| 38. Formal actions / outcomes | Corrections, suspensions, badge changes, alerts, referrals and published determinations | Hundreds of disciplinary actions annually, plus bars, suspensions, fines and restitution | Adverse-action and dispute outcomes; not publicly aggregated | Not publicly aggregated | Not publicly aggregated | Not publicly aggregated | 30 Final Notices, 17 convictions, 137 intervention outcomes and 1,264 cancellations in 2025/26 | Investigations, court matters, bans and administrative actions; annual total varies |
| 39. Approx. budget per employee | Target $150K–$250K at scale | ~$350K–$400K | Estimated $400K–$650K | N/A separately | Estimated $90K–$140K | Estimated $160K–$240K | ~£155K | ~A$420K–A$525K |
| 40. Efficiency model | Automate collection and scoring; reserve analysts for exceptions and high-value reviews | Large fixed regulatory workforce; broad supervision with selective deep investigation | High-volume automated screening with human exception handling | Automated screening with human exception handling | Global operations plus localized manual fulfillment | Global operations plus localized manual fulfillment | Risk-based supervision; AI reportedly reduced simple-case handling from hours to minutes | Risk triage: many reports logged, a minority prioritized for further assessment |