We do ask tenants to confirm they’ve viewed the property, as well as make it clear they are not holding the property, simply putting forward an application which the landlord ultimately decides on. There is no obligation made to the tenant until a landlord accepts a holding deposit.
In terms of your suggestion, if it was to be that a landlord had to confirm a tenant prior to them starting their application, the issues would be potentially clunky/painful. For example, if you enabled userA@example.com to place a holding deposit - as that’s the email they used when enquiring, but the tenant actually wanted to use a different account, or that’s the lead tenants partner and the tenant actually placing the deposit is different, then the second account/email would no longer have access and would need granting access. This would require some back and forth and in the worst case put tenants off using the process at all.
Rent Now tenancy creation is designed to be extremely simple to use, whilst maintaining flexibility for very advanced scenarios (eg. contract specifics, deadline for agreement and other tenant fees act laws, etc), all whilst keeping respective parties in control 24/7.
As it stands tenants aren’t made any promises until an application is accepted, and landlords can reject a holding deposit via SMS reply or a simple click of a button. Landlords can request holding deposits from tenants they wish to proceed with to formalise this process. As before, if landlords have any particular preferences, like not starting Rent Now until certain steps have happened, we 100% recommend outlining this to tenants when they enquire.
We’re always open to feedback, but we do need to balance ease-of-use and flexibility against restrictive measures. It sounds like we need to work on messaging, as a tenant placing an application should hopefully be a positive sign rather than a negative one. Much like them enquiring about your property, which should be seen as a potentially positive step towards finding your perfect tenant.