   | Welcome to the Notary Talk General Discussion Forum. Before posting, please read the  |
| You are replying to this message: | | |
Posted by  JanetK_CA on 5/30/16 4:12pm
I remember when it was routine that a tc hiring direct would pay the notary the same fee that they would pay to a signing service hiring the notary. But that concept got lost with the massive influx of new people joining the field who didn't know any better and quoted ss level fees to tc's.
The signing service, of course, has to keep at least some of the fee to cover their overhead and make some profit to stay in business. Typically (but not always), signing services negotiate a flat rate per signing, as they make their money on volume. The scope of what they do doesn't vary greatly per assignment, unlike for us.
Many were able to justify their cut to both the ss and the notary. They saved the tc time searching for an NSA and they acted as a buffer between the two. From the notary's perspective, by working through the middle man, the expectation was that the ss would handle setting the appointment, being available to answer questions, if necessary, and backing up the notary by covering fees for no-signs (if the tc didn't pay that), extra trips (not the notary's fault) and oversize packages, to name a few. That was why it made sense for newbies to cut their teeth working for a ss. Title co's don't have time for what many consider "babysitting" the notary.
Over the years, some of these concepts have been lost, either in the struggle to survive, by poor management, or the desire to enrich oneself. As we all know, some ss chose business models where they keep as much of the fee as possible to line their own pockets. For others, as the volume started to dwindle with market conditions and increasing competition, some decided they needed to keep more from each transaction to maintain revenue levels. Still others began to compete with other ss for tc business by cutting their own fees vs. promoting quality and value. And, of course, what Mike said about some tc's getting into the game by keeping some of that cut for themselves. All of that magnified the downward spiral on fees to us.
None of that would have worked, however, if they weren't successful at finding many notaries willing to go along with fee cuts - or who were new enough to not know any better. They bought the "that's the going rate in your area" line. But let's not forget that there are still a few who've been able to avoid those choices and whose business models involve providing excellence, charging appropriate fees, and appropriately paying the one actually providing the excellent service.
"If you've got a stable of those who will do that, more power to you - guard it with your life and continue to nurture it."
Valuable advice! And IMO, part of what it means to "guard it with your life" is to not shoot yourself (and your valued client) in the foot by giving them up to the rest of the notary community by naming them here. The very good ones I've spoken with don't want to be spending a big chunk of their time fielding requests from scads of other notaries at all different levels of competence who want to jump onto the gravy train. Some have even told me that they've posted certain requirements on their profiles to discourage new applicants.
Think about that and be smart! By all means, rate them in SC, but that should be enough. We want to know the bad players so we can avoid them, so they should be named here, but that doesn't mean we need to disclose our most valuable business resource, which is our good client list... And remember that the list of those companies is getting shorter, as Mike said.
|
|
