verification - Email address as username--how to reduce incidence of bad entry

I work on a web app that requires users to complete a form for registration including their email address. The form has to be approved by a human before an account is created. The email address is then used as their username. The admin users creating the accounts are running into issues of mistyped email addresses, resulting in an inability to create an account for the end user.

I've suggested a double entry email to confirm (ick) as well as an extra step of immediate confirmation email for verification. Neither idea is great. Looking for other ideas.