Posted by LatteLady/NV on 9/20/10 11:12am
Msg #353155

Be careful taking jobs that pay by the hour

Recently I took a job that would pay me by the hour and not per notary acknowledgment or jurat. It was in the late evenings when I rarely have any work and it was only a temporary situation. I was told that I would be notarizing about 25 people in a 4 to 6 hour period. Doing 25 notarizations in 4 to 6 hours didn't seem to be a big deal to me and I figured I'd come out about even. Well I was miserably wrong.
You see each person of the 25 people had anywhere between 25 to 40 jurats each. By the end of the night, I had done 740 jurats. Which equals to thousands of dollars in jobs. I was so angry and felt so used, but I felt that I had to finish the job that I had started. A job that was supposed to be 6 hours worth of work ended up to be 10 hours and I was sore and exhausted when I got finished.

If a company calls you and asks you to notarize Affidavits of Circular forms, which is notarizing petitions, SAY NO! Luckily it was only a mistake I made once.

Reply by Calnotary on 9/20/10 11:26am
Msg #353156

I hope you got paid at least 50/hour.

Reply by Barbara___IL on 9/20/10 12:05pm
Msg #353164

Thanks for the warning.

Reply by PAW on 9/20/10 12:23pm
Msg #353170

A good business practice ...

... is to be sure you completely understand what the 'job' entails. Ask a million questions when you are solicited for hourly or day work. Be sure to ask all the basic questions: What, Where, When, Why, and How. (The two latter ones are pretty apparent, but make sure the solicitor is aware of YOUR procedures.) In this case, you apparently weren't told what the "what" entails. Had you know the full job description, you may have approached it differently.

Reply by PHILL2BY on 9/21/10 10:38am
Msg #353276

Re: A good business practice ...

Can I ask you where was the signings taking place in a hall??

Reply by SharonMN on 9/21/10 11:25am
Msg #353285

To me it wouldn't make any difference. An hour of my time is an hour of my time, whether I complete 1 notarization or 50 duing that hour.

However, in the situation you mentioned, I might have suggested we would need to schedule day two or add another notary once I realized what the job entailed. The hiring party would still get 4-6 hours of my time, but they might not be able to get through the amount of stuff that needed notarization in that amount of time. At 25-40 jurats per person, I would need to either schedule an hour per person or at least 1/2 hour and prepare some preprinted certificates with their name, venue, etc. ahead of time.

Reply by JanetK_CA on 9/21/10 6:36pm
Msg #353335

Right!

And as PAW said, it's all about asking the right questions to know what you're dealing with, then negotiating accordingly.

Also, in that type of situation, I wouldn't think in terms of the per-signature fee as a standard. That would probably never happen. Presumably you'd be in one place with everyone coming to you, and you're just a notarizing machine. However, it still needs to be a reasonable per hour fee - and a reasonable expectation of how long it's going to take (including breaks, as appropriate).