Third-party verification (TPV) is a process of getting an independent party to confirm that the customer is actually requesting a change or ordering a new service or product.
[1] In many parts of the world, especially the United States, long distance providers, telemarketing companies are required by law to use a third-party verification service while selling products or services over the phone or they may face substantial penalties or criminal sanction.
[1] A TPV provider allows companies to prove that a consumer agreed to almost any kind of sale or other transaction, using either email or telephone or both, and obtain a legally binding instrument in the process.
For example, in a just-completed experimental study of consumer reactions to electronic contracts, over 80% of respondents agreed that a transaction was harder to dispute because the verification was made and held by an independent third party.
Currently, TPV elements are used in complex verification and approval of different web transactions in conjunction with address verification services provided by credit card companies, IP geolocation, phone type identifying (land line, mobile, VoIP etc.