Posted by Sylvia_FL on 7/5/12 10:00am
Msg #425601
Clueless notaries
Gentleman called me this morning. He and his wife have certificates from the local police dept stating they have no criminal record - they are going to the Dominican Republic as missionaries. The records clerk had signed the certificates. They have to send off for an apostille and discovered they needed the certificates notarized. They took them back to the records office and the notary in the office said she was reluctant to put her seal on it, she didn't feel comfortable about it, but she had the records clerk sign the certificates again and she put her seal on the documents! No notarial certificate!!!
The couple sent the certificates off to the S.O.S office to obtain apostilles. Of course the S.O.S returned them as being incorrectly notarized and attached the sample notarial certificates to the letter.
Gentleman called the records office and the notary told him she didn't have the correct stamp for that (????) He took the package to his bank and was also told by the bank notary that she didn't have the correct stamp!
I had him bring the package to me, I looked at it and I called the notary at the records office. She said she only stamps police documents. After a few minutes conversation I discovered that that is all she does, puts her notary seal on documents. Doesn't fill out a certificate or anything else. I explained about notarial certificates and what is required in Florida and I asked her if she had a copy of the notary handbook, she said she got one when she got her commission. I asked her how long she had been a notary, she said a while (I just checked and she got her commission in February 2011).
I had to explain to her what needed to be done.
I gave the gentleman acknowledgment and jurat certificates for the documents explaining that I couldn't tell the notary that an acknowledgment was what was needed as the notary had to make the decision which certificate was appropriate.
He is going back to the records dept to hopefully have it put right. He was very happy for my assistance, asked how much he owed me and I told him not to worry about it I was happy to help. He insisted on giving me $20 and he took a bunch of my business cards.
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Reply by GOLDGIRL/CA on 7/5/12 8:16pm
Msg #425700
Pretty sad. It reminds me of an NSA (and I use that term very loosely) whose loan I conducted, and when I got to the affidavits that require an oath (subscribed and sworn to) she had no idea what I was doing. She said she had never in her entire loan-signing career ever administered an oath and had no idea what it was about!
CA now has a $700 fine or soething like that for not giving an oath where required, but I'm sure that's beyond her comprehension, too.
In any case, your notary clearly wins the blue ribbon for biggest screw-up!
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