Colorado Notary Journal

The notarial certificate (“notarization”) itself is the universal method of recording notarial acts. This is the record a notary is always required to make. It is not a record the notary can keep in his/her possession, however, and it is not the one people think of first. The record that occurs to most of us is the notary journal. [12-55-111 C.R.S.]

What is a notary journal? It is a “day-to-day” chronological record of a notary’s official acts, a record that the notary maintains and keeps in his/her possession. A journal is not necessarily kept in a bound book printed for the specific purpose of recording notarial acts. Those are handy to have, since they feature built-in reminders of the types of information a notary may want to track on his/her notarizations. They are not required by law, however. A notary may keep a journal in a diary, a spiral notebook, a calendar, a file folder, or on a computer, as far as the Notaries Public Act is concerned.

Why do notaries keep journals? Primarily for the following reasons:

To protect themselves;
To protect and assist clients and the general public; and
Because the law requires it, for some—but not all—transactions, in some—but not all—situations.

What transactions does Colorado law require to be recorded in a notary’s journal? [12-55-111 (1) C.R.S.] At present, though the Secretary of State’s office is working to change this, the Notaries Public Act requires only acknowledgments to instruments affecting the title to real property to be recorded in the journal. In fact, the Act exempts a notary from keeping a journal at all in some cases [12-55-111 (3) C.R.S.]. If the notary’s firm or employer, in the regular course of business, keeps the documents s/he notarizes, or copies of them, the notary may dispense with the journal altogether.

The Secretary of State recommends that notaries keep records of all their official acts.

Every notary public shall keep a journal of every acknowledgment taken by such notary to an instrument affecting the title to real property and, if required, give a certified copy of or a certificate as to any such journal or any of such notary's acts, upon payment of such notary's fee.
For each notarial act, a notary's journal may contain the following information:

The type and date of the notarial act;
The title or type of document or proceeding that was notarized and the date of such document or proceeding, if different than the date of the notarization;
The name of each person whose oath, affirmation, acknowledgment, affidavit, declaration, deposition, protest, verification, or other statement is taken;
The signature and address of each person whose oath, affirmation, acknowledgment, affidavit, declaration, deposition, protest, verification, or other statement is taken;
The signature, printed name, and address of each witness to the notarization;
Any other information the notary considers appropriate to record that concerns the notarial act.

Subsection (1) of this section shall not apply to any document or electronic record where the original or a copy of such document or electronic record contains the information otherwise required to be entered in the notary's journal and such original or copy or electronic record is retained by the notary's firm or employer in the regular course of business.
Notwithstanding any provision of this subsection (3) to the contrary, no firm, employer, or professionally licensed person shall prohibit an employee who is a notary from maintaining a journal of his or her notarial acts in the regular course of business of such firm, employer, or professionally licensed person.
For purposes of this subsection (3), "firm" includes but is not limited to an office where the business of a real estate broker, lawyer, title insurance company, title insurance agent, or other licensed professional is regularly carried on and the records of such business are regularly maintained.

Except as otherwise exempted by paragraph (a) of subsection (3) of this section or by another law of this state, for each electronic record or document signed by the notary public, the notary public shall record the document authentication number issued by the secretary of state for each document authenticated in the journal pursuant to this section.

Every notary public shall send or have delivered notice to the secretary of state within thirty days after the notary loses or misplaces such notary's journal of notarial acts, or official seal, or the notary becomes aware that any other person has electronic control of his or her electronic signature. The fee payable to the secretary of state for recording notice of a lost journal, or seal, or that another person has electronic control of a notary's electronic signature shall be determined and collected pursuant to section 24-21-104 (3), C.R.S.