Posted by hcampersFL on 10/17/06 9:32pm
Msg #153204

Vital Signings~ Long

I get a call at 7:05 pm tonight for a signing with Vital Signings, am I available? Yes I am. (I just got back from a closing and could and would be glad to go back out.)

I ask what type of loan it is, they tell me it's a re-fi for a 1st and 2nd, two loans. I ask where is the location, she gives me the zip and says it maps at 27.5 miles from me. I ask what is the fee? She says "$100...Oh no my bad we can pay $125." I said for each loan? nope that would be the fee for the whole thing. I started laughing and told her you really expect to call someone with this late notice and offer them that fee and they are going to take it? She said what do you charge? I said I would start at $200. ( I say that because they will always sneak in fax backs etc.) She says we can't go that high. I said well good luck because I'm not able to do it for that fee.

Can you believe $125. for 1st and 2nd with edocs, 27.5 miles one way? The worst part it you know someone did take it.

Reply by Jenny_CA on 10/17/06 9:47pm
Msg #153211

I have had 3 notaries in the past week tell me that they do take low fees because they are afraid of losing the business.

I gave referral to each of them because my clients were having trouble finding Spanish speaking notaries and for personal reasons I couldn't help them out.

I "bumped" fees from: $50 - to $125, $100 to $150, and $125 to $175. Each of the notaries were surprised and said they wouldn't take the fees they were taking anymore. I told them it was up to them but I sure wasn't going to refer business to them in the future if they were going to be undercutting me.

Reply by hcampersFL on 10/17/06 9:49pm
Msg #153213

Well they didn't call back so I guess someone took it. If you are going to call me at the last minute for that type of job be prepared to pay the $$$.

Reply by Linda_H/FL on 10/17/06 9:48pm
Msg #153212

Sadly you're probably right - they probably did find someone to take it at those prices..

Maybe with a lil luck you'll get the call tomorrow - and then your price should be $225!!..<G>

Reply by hcampersFL on 10/17/06 9:50pm
Msg #153214

I had already told my husband that I would be going up $25. They won't call, they only call when they can't find anyone else.

Reply by Linda_H/FL on 10/17/06 9:55pm
Msg #153217

Last double I did last week (another company) took me 3 hours to get through the 1st and 2nd and all the additional affidavits - to me it's well worth $225 for a double at that time of night - worth more!!

Reply by ReneeK_MI on 10/18/06 3:49am
Msg #153249

Here's an angle - what would be your strategy if you wanted to cause the NSA community at large to lower their fees?

What if you made it a policy to low-ball at least the first 2 or 3 calls, then just go with the lowest bid? What if you gasped and applied theatrics to your response when the bids were over a certain low mark? What if you said things to imply that THAT NSA's fees were SO FAR out of the ballpark that surely they must not be AWARE that EVERYONE does these jobs for X amount?

Of course, you would NEVER call the first or second people back and tell them you couldn't find anyone lower. You'd just go with the third or fourth person, regardless - and you'd tell them "Well, just this once because THIS one just HAS to close tonight."

I'm not saying they DIDN'T find some fool to take the bait - I'm just saying maybe we shouldn't always assume that they DID. We could probably safely assume, however, that WE are not going to know!

Reply by Jack Greenberg, Notary Public - AAA Mobile Notary Services on 10/19/06 7:45pm
Msg #153768

When I first began doing signings, they called me and like an idiot I took the job for $75. And from that very first encounter, what I remember is they called me twice to confirm and make sure I contacted the borrower. While in the middle of the signing they called twice. Once to see how it was going, and then again with the attitude like you aren't finished yet. As soon as I get to the car as soon as I walked out the door, their rule is you call the on call person and confirm the signing took place, and I couldn't believe it, I get an answering machine. I leave the message with all their demands. But didn't get to ever talk to a real person, even after they as far as I am concerned harassed me to death while trying to do the signing, yet when you do as they say and try to call to check in, you get a machine??? Then when I get home, they had me faxing back on my nickel what seemed like almost every page from the signing. This place is ridiculous. And like you, I was at a signing and got a call from them that they had a client who had been stood up by whoever agreed to do it for them. It was raining and I needed gas, and the signing was 18 miles away one way. So I get home at around 9:00 pm, print out the doc's. Called the borrower to tell them I was on my way and they said, it's too late at night for us. You'll have to reschedule. So I call Vital Signing back to report the borrower would not sign that night after I went to all the trouble to make it happen. I wanted to know what was going to happen, would I get paid for anything, and what about all the documents I just printed, well over 200 pages (and my Dell laser printer cartridges cost me $140 each). So they call me the next morning and begrudingly say, well go ahead and do the signing since you have the doc's printed already. So for that job, they stepped up and paid me the extra $25 above their norm and paid me the $100. They called me one more time to do a signing I believe because they couldn't find anyone else to do it, and since they paid me the whooping whole $100 once, must have known they couldn't go back to $75 with me as they came right out and said we'll give you $100. Well, that isn't even my base fee anymore which is $125, before I even charge for document printing. But I haven't heard from them since because I think they are too cheap to keep paying me even $100 for a signing. Then as if I was in trouble because I didn't or forgot to make a call or do something, they sent me a more or less ball me out letter with another copy of their policies, all 14-16 of them, and told me to once again please review their policies. Well you know what they can do with their cheap fees and their faxes to death and their policies,,,,,,well, lets say the sun doesn't shine there. I haven't heard from them since, and even if I did, I will do what I did last time they did call and just told them I already had a signing for that time slot and was a gentleman about it. As far as I'm concerned, I call them the daycare for notary signing agents, since they treat you like your an idiot, ball you out, and pay crap. And like you said, the shame of it is you know they found some poor schmuck who took the job. Thats like what happened to me last week, when I got a call from E-notaries to go,or something like that, I will look it up and tell you exactly who it is, I think is their name. They asked me what my fee was and I told them it was $125 and would include ONE set of doc's. The guy said he would have to get approval for that fee, then came back on the phone and said OK we'll get back to you. So I penciled in that time slot since it was a 3:30 pm in the afternoon appointment. Well, by 3 pm the day of the signing, I still hadn't received any documents or confirmation who the clients were and was worried since the signing was in a half an hour. Then the guy tells me, "Oh, your fees are much too high, so we never told you you had the assignment yet when he came back on the phone after saying he would need to get approval for that fee, he definitely led me to believe he had gotten approval. But when I called a half an hour before the signing worried, he said, "Oh, I never told you I got approval (although he did) and said we found someone else in your area to do it for our usual fee, WHICH IS $60.00. WE MUST STICK TO OUR GUNS AS FAR AS OUR FEES GO. IF WE DON'T VALUE OUR WORK AND HOLD OUT FOR WHAT WE SHOULD BE GETTING PAID, THEN WE SHOULDN'T EVER EXPECT ANYONE OR ANY SIGNING COMPANY TO FEEL OUR WORK IS WORTH IT. What burns me the most is they must think we are total idiots because when you look at the Escrow HUD settlement sheet, you see Notary Fees, never below $250-$300. We do all the work, kiss butt, and they get most of the money. No way no more for me.