I’m thinking about getting a Pennsylvania notary acknowledgment stamp (and maybe a jurat stamp, too) to be ready for situations where a client needs a document notarized but the document doesn’t already include a notarial certificate. How often do you find that documents needing notarization are missing the required notarial certificate? If it happens frequently, would you recommend using a certificate stamp over attaching a loose certificate?
@jenny2002ni Hi Jenny, excellent professional question. 
The short answer is: “Yes!”
Of course, I’m unable to speak to the statues/regulations within your state specifically & will leave that component open for a Reply from our learned colleagues within the State of Pennsylvania.
I admire you & how you’re choosing to prepare yourself for creating a professional business.
I also hope you have created a comprehensive Business Plan to guide you forward as well.
There are several threads that advise on this topic within the Notary Cafe forum. Here is a listing of those threads:
https://forum.notarycafe.com/search?q=%22jurat+stamp%22
Also, I specifically have already posted on this topic within the Notary Cafe forum. You can find this post within this thread:
Just know that many years ago, before I ordered a separate stamp for acknowledgments and an additional separate stamp for jurats, I often found myself handwriting the certificate text (from a template) when needed on General Notary Work [GNW] for “missing” certificates.
It was quite tedious and time-consuming.
As a result, it was an easy decision to purchase stamps for these “missing” certificates.
In addition, I will strongly advise ALWAYS to query the signer by asking them to identify the type of certificate they will need for their document.
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PA and my state, VT, have both passed RULONA and have short form certificates that really are short. I’m not very busy as a notary, so I only face your situation once in a while. I don’t have these stamps, and suspect if I did that it wouldn’t fit. So I carry blank loose certificates, and if I don’t want to use that, I just write the certificate by hand.
One issue I’d have with a stamp is that I often have to include a bunch of signatories. For example, our town Board of Civil Authority comprises 18 members, and each must take an oath about property tax hearings. So at some meetings I might have to administer oaths to 10 people. I couldn’t fit 10 names in the space available on a jurat stamp.
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I bought them for FL several years ago - can say I never used them. I always carried a supply of certificates in my briefcase and used loose certs more than the stamps. When the law changed and the required wording was revised a few years ago I never re-ordered.
To me, the stamps were a waste of money. JMO
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California has specific verbiage for both the Acknowledgment and the Jurat certs. Our Ack is a long one and, when needed, I always attach a loose cert. Our Jurat is short and, depending on available space on doc or for required signers, I’ll either attach a loose cert or use my stamp.
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I am a Pennsylvania notary and purchased the stamp bundle from PAN. I mostly use them for GNW handwritten documents are the most common. On occasion, I have used them on a loan document that was to be notarized but for whatever reason the notary certificate wasn’t there. I call the hiring entity to find out what they want. I also have the certified copy stamp which is nice since I can stamp right on the copy. Most of them don’t get used all that often, but I am glad that I have them. I also have loose certificates that I made that have the additional information block like the ones from the NNA.
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I’m in Virginia and I had an Acknowledgement stamp made for that purpose. The problem is that in order to make it legible, I had to make it something like 8.5 X 5" and so far, it has been too large to fit on any document I’ve come across. I spent something like $100 for it, which includes the stamp pad, so I feel that I wasted my money. I’m pretty sure I ordered it from rubberstamp.net. I’ve been doing this for four years and so far, not a single loose notarization I’ve done has been rejected. So my advice is to save your money.
In my state (California), our jurats are state-specific. For example, I use my jurat stamp on all non-compliant mortgage documents, and no, I don’t staple loose jurats to affidavits. I stamp right on top of the non compliant jurat and fill it out with my blue pen. I’ve done it thousands of times without one complaint.
I have an acknowledgment stamp and a seperate disclaimer stamp that works great for corporate documents that require an apostille. Once again never a rejection by the Secretary of State, USDOS, or any Embassy legalization.
Hi, does that mean California notaries can use a stamp for the notary verbiage? That could potentially save some work. I use whatever Ackie is in the package (as we are permitted to) and adjust as required but swap out Jurats.
Want to give the folks at the title company a good laugh? Just toss a hefty stack of documents onto the scanner, mix in a few stapled pages, and watch the chaos unfold.
ewing_joe, if I only look at the posts in this thread, I infer that you think that staples should not be used if the document is to be put in a “hefty stack” and sent to a title company. At the same time CA and my state, VT, both require a loose certificate be “attached” to the document, and the usual way to do that is a staple. So you’re only alternative is to use a jurat or acknowledgement stamp.
However, some documents don’t have room for the stamp, and the certificate provided with the document is hopeless and can’t be corrected. So then what?
I suppose one could claim that by putting the whole stack in a FedEx or UPS envelope and sealing it, the loose certificate has been attached to the document. That might or might not fly.
I write on the certificate I’m replacing “please see attached” and initial. I cannot scan a document with the ADF on a scan so I don’t affix it but leave it for Escrow if that document records. Not all notarized documents do.
Keaton4notary, what’s an ADF?
Months before our jurat became state-specific, I had Harry create a Disclaimer stamp to be used along with our acknowledgments and jurats. When needed, I still use that same stamp for acknowledgments, but I had him create a slim jurat stamp that contains the disclaimer wording. That’s what I’ve been using for the last 10 years. To help you understand, since you seem to not get it, I stamp it directly on top of the existing non-compliant jurat. There’s always a clear space for my notary stamp. But it’s entirely my discretion, and I staple a lot of loose certificates in my general notary practice. I have a question for you, when you notarize a deed of trust, do you staple all 18 pages together or do you just staple the acknowledgment to the back of the signature page or do you not staple them all?
My answer is maybe, maybe not.
Automatic Document Feeder. You don’t have to lay the paper down on the scanner one at a time.
I assume we’re talking about rubber stamps. If I were to stamp an oath stamp over existing oath certificate language, the words would be on top of each other and many of the words would be illegible. So I’d be filling out utter nonsense, which would be illegal.
I’m not a mobile notary anymore. The last year or so I did that, the staple rule came into effect and I stapled all 18 pages together, and put a warning in large letters at the front of the package there were stapled documents within. Now, when I have a multi-page document to deal with (generally only 3 or 4 pages) I staple all the pages together.
Sometimes in notary forums, I see people claim we notarize signatures, not documents. I don’t entirely agree. Each notarial act is different, but here’s one from 26 VSA § 5304. Definitions
(23) “Verification on oath or affirmation” means a declaration, made by an individual
on oath or affirmation before a notary public, that a statement in a record is true.
Combining that with the part of the law on notarial acts, I’m certifying that the notarial act occurred on a certain date, in a certain county of Vermont, with a certain person who I have identified, that the appearer swore or affirmed, that the appearer signed a record. It doesn’t seem right to me to not attach the certificate to the entire record, not just the part with the appearer’s signature. However, I haven’t seen anything from the Vermont SOS or in the required continuing education about the details of attaching the certificate.
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