HiPeople Alternative for Reference Checks | RefWorthy
Looking for a HiPeople alternative? RefWorthy is the focused option. It gives you scored references, candidate profiles built from CVs and branded reports, at a published price.
Looking for a HiPeople alternative? HiPeople has grown into a broad hiring platform, with application screening, skills assessments and AI-led interviews alongside reference checks. That's a lot of tooling, and for teams that mainly want dependable, well-structured reference checks, much of it can go unused.
RefWorthy is the focused option. It gives you scored references, candidate profiles built from CVs and branded reports, at a published price. Read on for how it works, then how it compares with HiPeople on features, cost and fit.
How RefWorthy works as a HiPeople alternative
RefWorthy is built around a simple question: what did the people who worked with this candidate actually see? It gathers those answers in a structured way, adds what it learns from the candidate's CV, and turns it all into a report you can act on. Agencies use it to check candidates for clients, and HR teams use it for their own hiring.
On the Pro tier and above, you start by uploading the candidate's CV. RefWorthy extracts the relevant details into a candidate profile, so there's no retyping, and you can add a work style assessment if you'd like a sense of how the candidate prefers to work. Then you set the questions, using a template or your own questionnaire, and give each one a weighting based on what matters most for the role.
When you're ready, RefWorthy emails each referee a link to an online form. The email can come from your own domain, so it's clearly from you, and referees complete the form in their browser without needing to reply. Anyone who hasn't responded gets automated reminders, and you can always request a phone call if you'd prefer a conversation.
As responses come in, RefWorthy checks them for suspicious activity, using IP matching, same device or network detection, email domain confirmation and other alerts. The weighted answers produce a candidate score, and the full report carries your branding, ready for a client or hiring manager.
Pricing is in rand, tiered by how many candidates you check, and the process is designed with POPIA in mind. Custom ATS integrations are available on a quoted basis, and you can start on a free tier with your first three candidates.
RefWorthy vs HiPeople: feature by feature
HiPeople spreads across the whole pre-hire process. RefWorthy concentrates on making the reference stage as strong as possible, with weighted scoring, CV-based profiles and branded reports, and keeps setup simple and pricing local.
RefWorthy | HiPeople | |
|---|---|---|
What it covers | Reference checks, CV-based candidate profiles and work style assessments | Reference checks, application screening, skills assessments and AI interviews |
Who it's for | Agencies and in-house HR teams | Mainly in-house talent acquisition teams |
Users | One on the free tier, unlimited on paid tiers | Not listed |
Reaching referees | Online surveys with automated email reminders; phone call on request | Fully outsourced outreach, including candidate and referee support |
Custom email domain | Yes | Not listed |
Questions | Templates or your own questionnaire | Role-specific templates and custom questions |
Follow-up questions | Automatic follow-ups when answers are unclear | Automatic follow-ups when answers are unclear |
Candidate scoring | Score based on question weightings you set | Benchmarks built around your organisation |
CV processing | Builds a candidate profile from an uploaded CV (Pro tier and up) | Application screening module |
Assessments | Optional work style assessment | Library of skills and personality assessments |
Fraud and verification | Multiple suspicious-activity alerts, including IP matching, same device or network detection and email domain confirmation | Device fingerprinting, IP and VPN alerts, phone-number checks and professional network verification |
Reports | Branded reports on every tier | Reports synced to your ATS or HRIS |
Integrations | Custom ATS integrations, quoted per project | Ready-made integrations with many ATS and HRIS platforms, plus Slack |
Try before you buy | Free tier with your first 3 candidates | Free trial available |
What HiPeople offers
HiPeople offers a wide set of tools. Its reference checks are fully outsourced, with HiPeople handling candidate and referee queries, and it adds automatic follow-up questions, bias detection and layered fraud signals such as device fingerprinting and VPN alerts. Assessments, application screening and AI interviews sit on the same platform, and it holds enterprise certifications including SOC 2 Type II.
That depth is designed for large in-house talent teams running high volumes across the US and Europe. It's priced in US dollars and assembled module by module, so cost and setup grow with everything you add. If your goal is better hiring decisions without an enterprise rollout, RefWorthy gives you scored, verified references and candidate profiles from day one.
RefWorthy vs HiPeople pricing
HiPeople uses modular pricing, charged per candidate in US dollars. What you pay depends on which modules you choose, and enterprise pricing is custom. Check HiPeople's pricing page for current rates.
RefWorthy publishes tiered pricing in rand at refworthy.com/pricing, based on how many candidates you check. You can start on a free tier with one user and your first three candidates, and every paid tier, from Starter to Unlimited, comes with unlimited users. Branded reports are part of every tier, and CV processing is included from Pro upwards.
Because HiPeople's price depends on the modules you pick and is charged in US dollars, it can be hard to pin down upfront. RefWorthy's pricing is published, so you know exactly what you'll pay before you start.
Is RefWorthy the right HiPeople alternative for your team?
Go with RefWorthy if:
reference checks, candidate scoring and CV-based profiles cover what you need
you hire in South Africa and want to pay in rand
you're an agency that needs branded reports for clients, or an HR team that wants a clear report for hiring managers
you'd rather get started in minutes than through an implementation project
HiPeople may suit you if:
you want skills assessments and AI interviews on the same platform
you're a large enterprise that needs US or EU data hosting and SOC 2 Type II
You can try RefWorthy on three real candidates for free, with no sales call needed. Check your first 3 candidates free
HiPeople alternative FAQs
Can I use HiPeople just for reference checks? Yes. HiPeople's pricing is modular, so you can choose reference checks without the other modules, though its strength is in combining them.
Is RefWorthy as automated as HiPeople? RefWorthy automates the parts that take the most time. It emails referees a link to an online form, sends reminders until they respond and builds candidate profiles from CVs, so your team only steps in when there's a decision to make. HiPeople also outsources candidate and referee support, which mainly suits very high-volume teams.
How does candidate scoring compare? RefWorthy scores candidates using the weightings you set on each question, so the score reflects what matters for that role. HiPeople compares candidates against benchmarks built from your organisation's own data.
Does HiPeople work for recruitment agencies? HiPeople's site focuses mostly on in-house hiring teams. Agencies can use it, but features such as client-facing branded reports are a bigger focus for RefWorthy.
What's the best HiPeople alternative for South African teams? If you want strong reference checks without an enterprise platform, RefWorthy is a focused HiPeople alternative. It combines automated online reference checks with weighted candidate scoring, CV-based profiles and fraud alerts, with published pricing in rand.
