Frequently asked questions.

HandUp is a platform that helps friends and family formalize personal loans. Instead of a handshake deal with no paper trail, HandUp creates a structured agreement with a repayment schedule, scheduled ACH payments, and documentation — so everyone is on the same page.

No. HandUp is software — not a bank or a lender. We help people manage and document loans they agree to between themselves. The loan itself is between the parties you choose — HandUp is not a party to it. Bank transfers are processed through our payments partner and its financial-institution partner (see the "How money moves" section below).

HandUp is for anyone lending or borrowing money with people they trust — family members helping a child buy a car, friends pooling together to help someone through a rough patch, or a small community supporting a local entrepreneur.

Our payments partner and its financial-institution partner. When a loan disbursement or repayment is due, HandUp tells our payments partner what amount to move between which linked bank accounts, and the ACH transfer is processed through that partner and the financial institution it works with.

With our payments partner. ACH transfers in the U.S. take a few business days to settle. After a payment is collected it's held with our payments partner while it clears, for a few business days or about two weeks for a payment above $5,000, then each lender's share is sent to their bank. Money in transit isn't FDIC-insured.

Our industry-leading bank-linking partner. You enter your bank login inside its secure, tokenized flow — HandUp never sees your username, password, account number, or routing number. The bank-linking partner hands a tokenized credential to our payments partner, which is what enables future transfers.

Our identity-verification partner. You upload an ID + a selfie and confirm details like your date of birth, address, and Social Security number; the partner checks the document, matches the selfie, and verifies the details. The verified details are then shared with our payments partner to set up the account your bank transfers run through. HandUp doesn't see or store your ID documents.

No. HandUp has no access to your bank balance, transaction history, statements, or account number. Transfers are only started for a loan you've agreed to — in the amounts and on the dates in its schedule — or for a payment you start yourself.

Software. We provide: the loan agreement (amount, rate, schedule and payment terms — as a PDF you both keep), the repayment schedule (principal/interest/fee split calculated each month), the user interface and notifications, coordination with our partners (we tell our payments partner what to move when, on your behalf), tax summary reports, and the HandUp Reliability tier. Bank linking and identity checks happen at our bank-linking and identity-verification partner; bank transfers are processed through our payments partner and its financial-institution partner.

For the software, not for moving money. The 1.00% annual platform fee and the origination fee ($40, plus a per-lender surcharge on pooled loans) cover loan-agreement generation, payment-schedule management, ACH coordination with our payments partner, tax-summary reports, and ongoing platform maintenance. Our payments partner's own per-transfer ACH fee is paid out of HandUp's fees — you only ever see the HandUp number.

An outage at a partner would temporarily pause that part of HandUp — bank linking and identity checks, or bank transfers. Loan agreements and payment history are stored by HandUp and aren't affected.

Solo loans start at $250. Pooled loans (2+ lenders) start at $500. Each pledge is at least $50, unless a smaller one completes the request. For now, loans can be up to $10,000. The minimum term is 6 months.

Yes. HandUp supports pooled lending, where several lenders each contribute a portion of the total loan amount, up to 8 lenders per loan. Each lender's share is tracked separately, and repayments are distributed proportionally.

Yes, lenders can set any interest rate including 0%. If the rate is below the IRS Applicable Federal Rate (AFR), the IRS may treat the forgone interest as a gift to the borrower — and in some cases as interest income to the lender. Some smaller loans (generally $10,000 or less in total between the same two people) are exempt. Forgone interest above the annual gift exclusion ($19,000 per person in 2026) generally counts toward the lender's federal lifetime exemption. HandUp shows the AFR during loan creation for reference — this isn't tax advice.

HandUp charges a flat annual platform fee of 1.00% added to the borrower's interest rate, plus a one-time $40 origination fee. On a loan request, the borrower chooses whether it's deducted from the amount disbursed or added to their first scheduled payment(s). On a loan a lender offers, the lender chooses one of those or pays it themselves: it's added to their bank debit when the borrower accepts, and the borrower receives the full amount. On a loan a lender logs after it was made, it's added to the borrower's first scheduled payment(s), or the lender pays it as a one-time debit from their bank when the borrower accepts. Pooled loans (2+ lenders) add a per-additional-lender surcharge that scales with the loan term — starting at $5 and growing for longer loans, since each extra lender adds an ACH transfer every payment for the life of the loan. For a loan with one lender the fee is shown before you create it; for a pooled request the final fee depends on how many lenders join, and the loan agreement states the final figure. That's the whole pricing — no subscriptions, no add-on tiers.

Nothing is taken from your bank until the loan is fully funded and activated. If it doesn't fund, nothing moves. Once a loan is active, each installment is due on its scheduled payment date: HandUp initiates an ACH bank transfer from the borrower's bank on that date, or the borrower pays the installment in HandUp. Either way, the borrower's payment is split and distributed to each lender according to their share of the loan.

A few business days after the borrower's payment is collected, or about two weeks for a payment above $5,000 — not the same instant. After a payment is collected it's held with our payments partner while it clears, then each lender's share is sent to their bank. The hold covers the window in which a bank can still return an ACH debit (insufficient funds, a closed account, and so on), so lenders aren't paid out of funds that didn't actually arrive; a bigger payment is held longer. End to end, a lender typically sees their share within about a week of the borrower's payment date, or about three weeks for a payment above $5,000.

If a scheduled payment fails, the borrower and lenders are notified and it shows on the loan. HandUp doesn't collect on anyone's behalf — the written agreement is your record. HandUp doesn't charge late fees.

Extra payments and early payoff aren't available yet. For now, payments run on the agreed schedule.

Yes, for a scheduled payment. The borrower, or a lender receiving part of it, records it on the loan page with the date it was paid. It counts as paid once the borrower and every lender receiving part of it confirm it in HandUp — on a loan with several lenders, each confirms their own share. While it waits for confirmation, HandUp doesn't collect that payment from the borrower's bank. If it isn't confirmed within 14 days, or it's declined or withdrawn, it's due again on its due date — or, if that has passed, right away: it isn't collected automatically then, and the borrower pays it in HandUp. If a lender recorded it, or a lender declines the borrower's record, the wait doesn't count against the borrower: unless the payment was already missed, their HandUp Reliability tier counts it as due no earlier than when the record was declined, withdrawn or not confirmed in time, and the 3 days before it's marked missed start again then. If the borrower's own record isn't confirmed in time, or they withdraw it, the payment counts from its due date: it's marked missed if it's more than 3 days past its due date and still unpaid. After a record is declined or isn't confirmed in time — or is withdrawn more than a day after it was made, or for the second time in 7 days — that payment can't be recorded this way again for 7 days. HandUp's fee isn't charged on a payment made outside HandUp, so the amount is the principal and interest the lenders are owed. A payment that includes HandUp's origination fee can only be paid through HandUp, nothing can be recorded this way while HandUp's origination fee is still being collected from a lender's payouts, and extra payments or a payoff can't be recorded this way. A confirmed payment counts toward the borrower's HandUp Reliability tier, judged by the date it was paid, and appears in the tax summary.

If a scheduled payment fails, or an installment the borrower pays themselves is still unpaid three days after its due date (later if payments couldn't be made in HandUp at the time), the borrower and lenders are notified and it shows on the loan as missed. HandUp doesn't impose late fees or collect on anyone's behalf — the written agreement is your record. A missed payment also factors into the borrower's HandUp Reliability tier, which lenders they invite in the future will see.

Each missed payment is shown on the loan, and the borrower and lenders are notified. HandUp doesn't collect on anyone's behalf. The lender can choose to forgive the balance (which may have tax implications worth discussing with a tax professional), restructure the terms, or pursue repayment outside of HandUp. Missed payments are reflected in the borrower's HandUp Reliability tier, and HandUp keeps the payment history and the written agreement for both parties' records.

A tier-based signal — Building, Established, Strong, Good, Behind, or Concerning — computed from your completed payments on HandUp loans. New users sit at 'Building' until they have at least 6 completed payments. After that, you move into Established (perfect on-time, less than a year of history), or Strong (perfect on-time and 1+ year of HandUp history), or Good / Behind if some payments came in late. It's visible to lenders you invite to fund a loan unless you've toggled it off in your profile.

No. HandUp Reliability lives entirely inside HandUp — we don't report payment activity to Experian, TransUnion, Equifax, or any other credit bureau, and we don't sell or share it with third parties. It's only useful within your HandUp network. If you want bureau-reported credit, separate products like Experian Boost work alongside your existing financial accounts.

We look at every completed payment on loans where you're the borrower. A payment is 'on time' if it's made no later than 3 days after its due date; a payment that fails or is returned counts as missed, and so does an installment the borrower pays themselves that's still unpaid 3 days after its due date (later if payments couldn't be made in HandUp at the time). Building = fewer than 6 payments on record, missed ones included. Established = 6+ on-time payments with under a year of HandUp history. Strong = 100% on-time across 1+ year of HandUp loans with no late payments. Good = 90–99% on-time overall. Behind = under 90%. Concerning = one or more missed payments, once 6 or more are on record.

Yes. There's a toggle on your profile's reliability page — flip it off and your tier stops appearing on the loan page for lenders you invite. You still see it yourself. You can switch it back on any time.

No. It's a standard part of every HandUp loan — no fee, no subscription, no upsell. It's just on by default and you can opt out anytime.

Three reasons: (1) credit-bureau reporting requires becoming an FCRA-regulated data furnisher, which adds substantial compliance overhead for a small platform; (2) bureau reports take months to reflect new accounts, so a HandUp signal is faster; (3) the trust value is mostly captured by your immediate network — your aunt doesn't need Equifax to vouch for you, she just needs to see your HandUp history.

The loan itself isn't taxed — borrowed money isn't income, and making a loan isn't a taxable event for the lender. What can come into play is the interest. If a loan carries a rate below the IRS Applicable Federal Rate (AFR), the IRS may treat the forgone interest as a gift to the borrower, though some smaller loans are exempt. Charging at least the IRS Applicable Federal Rate (AFR) is a common way to keep a family loan from being treated as a gift. HandUp shows it for reference — this isn't tax advice.

The IRS publishes an annual figure — $19,000 per recipient in 2026 — that you can give without triggering any gift-tracking. That figure resets each January 1st and is the same whether you give cash, forgive interest, or forgive loan principal. A married couple can each use their own exclusion. The amount is adjusted for inflation periodically; check IRS.gov for the current figure.

Amounts above the annual exclusion get tracked against the federal lifetime gift and estate exemption ($15 million per person as of 2026). For most people the lifetime exemption is large enough that no tax is ever actually owed — anything tracked reduces the eventual estate exemption but doesn't trigger a current-year payment. The forms, filing, and timing are tax-professional territory.

Rarely — and almost never immediately. It only becomes an actual bill if total lifetime gifts above the annual exclusions exceed the lifetime exemption ($15 million in 2026). Even then, it's typically handled through the estate rather than as an out-of-pocket payment during a lifetime. If your situation might approach that, a CPA or estate attorney is the right next stop.

It may be. When a lender forgives part or all of a remaining balance, the forgiven amount may be treated as a gift to the borrower, in which case the same annual-exclusion plus lifetime-exemption framework applies. Tax treatment depends on the circumstances, so talk to a tax professional about your situation.

Only people you explicitly share your private invite link with can see your loan details. HandUp does not list loans publicly or share them without your permission.

Bank linking is done by our industry-leading bank-linking partner. You enter your bank login inside its tokenized flow — HandUp never sees your username, password, or full account number. The tokenized credential is then used for bank transfers through our payments partner. See the "How money moves" section above for the full chain.