Every adult on YardHound is checked.
A teenager doing yard work is going to a stranger's house, and a homeowner is letting a stranger into their yard. Both sides should know who they're dealing with before anyone shows up, so screening comes before anything else.
Who gets checked
| Who | ID and selfie | Background check | Fee |
|---|---|---|---|
| Homeowners | Yes | Yes, plus a sex offender registry check on every address where they post a job | $13 once, credited back |
| Adult workers | Yes | Yes | $13 once, from the first payout, credited back |
| Parents and guardians | Yes | No | None |
| Workers 14 to 17 | No. Their guardian is verified instead | No | None |
Step 1: ID verification
Every adult scans a government photo ID and takes a selfie through Stripe Identity. It takes about two minutes and proves the person is who they say they are, with a real name and date of birth.
The scan happens on Stripe's own secure pages. YardHound never sees or stores your ID images, your bank details or your Social Security number. We receive only the result and the verified name and date of birth, which we use for the background check.
Step 2: Background check
Using the name and birth date Stripe verified, we search Washington State criminal conviction records and the sex offender registry. A person reviews the results against fixed standards. There are no judgment calls and no exceptions.
Homeowners are not accepted with any sex offense conviction, and jobs can't be posted at an address where a registered sex offender lives.
Adult workers are not accepted with any sex offense conviction, or a conviction for a violent crime, burglary or theft in the last 7 years.
Nobody can post or accept a job until their checks are complete. We don't promise how long a check takes; we finish them as quickly as we can. Each person is checked once. Re-checks will be added as YardHound grows.
On the job
Screening decides who's on the app. These rules decide what happens at the house.
The hazard brief
Before a job goes live, the homeowner answers a hazard checklist and pins each one on the yard map with a photo: sprinkler heads, holes, slopes, a dog, a wasp nest. Workers see it before they accept.
The hazard walk
At the house, the worker taps and photographs every pinned hazard. The Start button doesn't unlock until every pin is done and the before photos are taken.
Photos on every job
Before photos, after photos, and an equipment settings photo where it matters (the mower deck height, for example). Kept for a year in case anything comes up.
Check-in at the house
A worker can only check in near the property and inside the time window. The gate code isn't shown until they do.
Messages stay in the app
Phone numbers, emails and links are blocked in bios, bids and job details, so nobody is contacted outside the app before a job is awarded.
Stop at any time
A worker can stop a job for any reason: weather, broken equipment, something unsafe. If something gets damaged, the homeowner is notified right away.
Ratings and reliability
Homeowners and workers rate each other after every job. Ratings stay hidden for 7 days so nobody rates in reaction to the other. Reliability, the share of awarded jobs that went as agreed over the last year, is shown on both sides.
Accounts that fall below our thresholds are suspended automatically and reviewed by a person before anything is permanent.
Report and block
Report or block anyone from their profile, the job screen or the rating screen. Blocks are silent.
A report about the safety of a minor, or about identity or age fraud, immediately pauses the reported account's new activity and preserves the job's records before anyone reviews it. The person reporting is never named.
If anyone is in danger, call 911 first.
What YardHound isn't. Workers are independent people, often teenagers, not licensed or insured professionals, and they aren't YardHound employees. We don't supervise or direct the work. Screening lowers risk but can't remove it. Every homeowner acknowledges this before posting. The details are in our terms of service.