A relieving letter is the easiest document to forge – and the one HR trusts most
Onboarding teams use it to confirm the candidate left the previous employer cleanly. The candidate knows it. So when an exit was messy or a notice period was skipped, a quick edit in Word can rewrite history. Visual review passes. Structural analysis does not.
HTPBE? analyzes the structural layer of the PDF file – the layer that records every edit, even invisible ones. We don’t inspect holograms, phone photos, or ID biometrics. If your fraud problem is a digitally fabricated or tampered relieving letter, we’re the most specific tool for it.
When HTPBE? returns INCONCLUSIVE on a relieving letter, that’s the expected baseline (these documents legitimately come from desktop tools at many employers); combine with other markers before flagging.
The problem
Modern document fraud is invisible to visual review
A growing class of document fraud opens a genuine PDF, edits a balance, a date, or a beneficiary, and re-saves it. Visually nothing changes – the document passes pixel-level review, layout review, and KYC.
Structural PDF analysis reads the layers rendering engines never expose: revision history, object structure, signature coverage maps. That is where edits leave fingerprints they cannot wipe.
Common tampering patterns
- Modified balances or totals after export
- Swapped IBAN or beneficiary on invoices
- Post-signature edits on contracts
- Backdated issue and modification dates
- Fabricated documents from consumer PDF tools
What this looks like
How fake and tampered relieving letters actually look
Three real fraud mechanics we catch at the structural PDF layer.
Reason for separation rewritten
Candidate was terminated for cause but writes the letter as a voluntary resignation. Original document opened in Adobe Acrobat or an online editor; one paragraph replaced; re-export. HTPBE? flags the edit made after issuance.
Last working day backdated to skip the notice-period gap
There is a six-month gap between the real last working day and the next employer’s start date – the candidate was either out of work or working somewhere they can’t mention. The date on the relieving letter gets pushed forward. The visual page still looks signed and stamped; the file’s own dates tell a different story.
Letter authored from scratch when no real one exists
No relieving letter was issued – the candidate left badly or the previous employer refuses to issue one. The candidate writes one in Word, lifts the company logo from LinkedIn, signs HR Manager’s name, exports. The file does not come back INTACT, however closely it copies the letterhead; image-stream metadata exposes the lifted logo.
The scale
Why your existing checks miss this
BGV calls the employer. The employer does not always answer.
When BGV cannot complete, the candidate fills the gap with a letter. Read the file.
BGV platforms (AuthBridge, IDfy, OnGrid, Springworks) call the previous employer to confirm separation. Indian BGV employer-response rates routinely run 70–85% – meaning 15–30% of cases get filled with the candidate’s submitted documents alone. HTPBE? catches the file the candidate sent, regardless of whether the previous employer responds. Use both: BGV when reachable, HTPBE? always.
What HTPBE? checks
Detection capabilities
Deterministic structural signals. No probabilistic scores, no model training.
No clean bill for a typed-up letter
A relieving letter typed up in Word, Excel or LibreOffice and exported directly does not come back INTACT, however closely it copies the employer’s letterhead. With no sign of later editing it returns INCONCLUSIVE for manual review; with evidence of editing or fabrication, MODIFIED.
Post-issuance edit detection
Editing a relieving letter after issuance – in a PDF editor, or by rebuilding it in other software – leaves structural evidence behind. HTPBE? flags it as MODIFIED.
Pasted-element detection
HTPBE? detects logos, letterheads and signatures lifted from another document and pasted in.
Digital signature presence and chain validity
Many large employers digitally sign relieving letters. Editing a signed letter after signing, or stripping its signature, is among the things HTPBE? looks for in the file.
Dates that disagree
When the file’s own dates show it was changed long after it was issued, HTPBE? flags it – a high-confidence signal for backdated separations.
Reassembled letters
HTPBE? detects letters assembled from pages of different sources and letters reworked after their original creation.
Share with engineering
Wire this into your intake pipeline in under a day
Two API calls – one POST to submit the PDF, one GET to retrieve the verdict. Forward this page to your engineering team; the full API reference, quotas, and copy-paste examples in cURL, JavaScript, Python, PHP, Go, and Ruby are one click away.
Pricing
Self-serve plans, no sales call
All plans include the same forensic checks. Pick the quota that matches your monthly document volume.
manualStarter
30 credits/mo
Manual spot-checks and integration testing
most commonGrowth
350 credits/mo
Active document processing pipelines
high volumePro
1,500 credits/mo
High-volume automation and API integrations
Enterprise (unlimited, on-premise available) — see full pricing
API key on signup. Free test environment on every plan. No card required.
Customer Stories
Teams that stopped document fraud
Compliance, finance, and risk teams use HTPBE? to catch manipulated PDFs before they become costly mistakes.
Caught an invoice where the total had been changed by less than a thousand dollars. Without this I would have approved it without a second look.
Sarah M.
AP Manager
United States
We had three applicants in the same week with bank statements that looked completely fine. Two of them were flagged as modified. You simply cannot see this by reading the document — it is in the file structure.
Lars V.
Risk Analyst, Online Lending
Netherlands
Salary slips were coming with altered figures. We identified two problematic files before the placement was finalised.
Priya K.
HR Operations Lead
India
Since we started checking documents this way, we stopped two applications early in the process that would have been very difficult to reverse later.
Julien R.
Fraud Analyst, Fintech
France
Some applicants were sending PDFs that looked authentic but had been edited in ways not visible to the eye. We now ask for checked originals when something is flagged. Already saved us from a few bad decisions.
Marta S.
Compliance Coordinator
Spain
One invoice was caught because there was a mismatch between the document dates and structure. That particular case would have cost us significantly.
Tariq A.
Finance Manager
United Arab Emirates
FAQ
Frequently asked questions
How is this different from BGV employer checks?
Can it catch backdated relieving letters?
modified, with named markers for the edit and for the dates that disagree.What if the previous employer used Microsoft Word for the original letter?
inconclusive, prompting a manual check with the employer rather than an automatic reject.Does the API need a reference original to compare against?
What does an INCONCLUSIVE verdict mean for a relieving letter?
status_reason says which. For a relieving letter, INCONCLUSIVE is the expected baseline for this document type rather than an automatic fraud signal. INCONCLUSIVE alone is a prompt for a manual check with the employer, not an automatic reject.Secure your workflow
Create your account – check PDFs on the web or with an API key, both ready on signup.
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