I received an email from this company inviting me to sign up with them so that I can get alerts to signings through their mobile app. This guy, Sebastian Vaduva says he’s the Co-founder of Signio and that it’s a San Francisco based company that just went public and they are trying to sign up notaries.
I clicked on the link to sign up (basic information) and received a reply welcoming me and asking me to click another link to complete an application. The email said that I have to click on the link from my mobile phone, which is a red flag to me, so I googled the company. What I found is that it’s based out of South Africa with no mention of San Francisco or the US!!! Not only that, I just found posts through google that further leads me to believe it’s all a scam. I do not plan to do any business with this company, but wanted to check anyway (and warn others).
Put this company out on Notary Rotary’s list and be sure to warn everyone to avoid them. I am drafting a letter to my congressman to have these signing companies regulated by both state and federal legislation and require them to post a bond of at least $1 million with the Secretary of State of all 50 states if they want to continue to do business. I am also asking to have the IRS investigate these companies to make sure they are filing tax returns and paying federal and state income taxes. I think there are too many of them that are not doing this and way too many of them ripping off the notaries.
Actually! If you google Signio San Francisco they’re listed, on Market Street. It is possible for more than one company to have the same name, it poor business practice, but possible.
Now here are my issues
1)gone public means they’re publicly traded, which this company is not
2) they have one Yelp review, 5 star and guess who it’s from, Sebastian V, what are the coincidences that ISNT Sebastian Vaduva? By trying to recruit mobile notaries to their business and inflating 5 star reviews they’re effectively eliminating competition. I think we can all work together to help each other out and refer business when we can’t take a job, without lining a middlemans pockets!
Sebastian from Signio here. I just came across your post and I feel there is some explaining I need to do.
Allow me to address some of the things you’ve mentioned:
Saying we went public: I believe there has been a misunderstanding in getting my message across. I’ve actually never said this in any of my emails on the contrary - I’m saying we’re a startup company from the very beginning. We’ve barely launched - there’s no way we could have gone public.
We’re not a typical signing company - I’m mainly a technology guy - I understand the benefits of technology and I can see how we can use it to make your life (and the life of other notaries) easier. There is a lot for me to learn when it comes to your industry ( pain points and the issues that come up with every signing). Happy to connect over a phone call to discuss this further in detail - it would enable us to build a better product for you.
The South Africa thing. This is a name coincidence and nothing else. The SA company offers a different product (electronic signature) in a different market. I’m really sorry for this name coincidence - and if this will prove a bottleneck for our company I’ll make sure to change the name. There’s one reference on Google about this that makes reference to this same confusion.
The email link: The only links I’ve sent out in my invitation email are the ones to our notary page for signup: http://usesign.io/#/notary and - after you sign-up I’m sending out a welcome email that contains link to the mobile applications ( a link is for the iOS app and the other one is for the Android app) so you can download them on your phone. This is how we’re able to send orders and track your location in conjunction with the customer’s location.
Again, I’m really sorry to have made you so reluctant. Maybe I can turn this around I’d love to have a chance to speak to you and better explain what we’re working on and why this is beneficial for you.
@betseylou & @jcanty - wanted to address your comments & concerns as well.
Going public: This is something that I have never claimed. Again - we’ve just started out and I never claimed we’re public.
Yelp Review: I actually removed that - truth of the matter is - it was my first time building a business page for Yelp, and please believe me - this process is easier said then done. ( I guess only the people that go through it can understand this) Yelp sends you through countless links and pages to be able finally setup a business page. I commented on the Signio page more as a description - I did not review the service in anyway - and it was a temporary thing as I was getting the hang of Yelp for businesses. It would have been so stupid of me to rate my own business and hope that helps with credibility. As said previously - we’re just starting up - we want to build something that helps you optimize transport times to your customers - as this is one of the factors that
takes a lot of your valuable time away.
On @jcanty’s concerns: We have no revenue, and right now - we’re not even making any money out of Signio as our main focus now is to test the concept in the market and build a relationship with you - the notaries.
Happy to answer any other questions and concerns any of you might have - but before putting us down, please give me a chance to address this!
You are the life and bloodline of the notary signing business. They charge $150 or more to title companies, push the work to you never appear on any paper document that you sign and pay you less that half of it or never pay or delay the pay. You take the risk, provide insurance, travel to make signings a thing of convenient fort the client, .
Why do we keep taking this? Desperate for cash is the only answer. I don’t mean to insult your hard work, but your desperation is that is turned into an exploitation.
So how to you put a stop to this?
You can complain & keep on complaining on these forums or coordinate your actions with notaries about this and upend the entire business process and flow…
** NOTARIES MUST UNITE FOR FAIR PAY & FAST PAY **
Just like any movement, for this to succeed , your absolute co-operation and steadfastness & resolute action is needed.
** ARE YOU ASKING YOURSELF. WHAT SHOULD I DO ?? **
Don’t accept any thing less that $100 in states outside of CA ( $125 or above in CA) . The days of $175 is still around, however very rare
Refuse any lowball offers and respond with your own quote of $125. If every notary worth his/her salt does this, it will succeed. What is a lowball offer ( anything less that $100 )
If you are not aware of a signing service & its track record:, and you don’t see a quick enough response, , ask for their credentials, like a photo ID or other details regarding owner of the signing agency. At the end of the day , it is one person at the top who is responsible in control of the money.
Submit an invoice along with the package & tell them that escrow/ title / lender is responsible to ensure payment reaches the notary .
Ask them to split the notary fees & pay what you are owned directly. They can pay the signing agency directly.
If notary service payment is not disbursed by escrow or if it fails to ensure that notary is not paid, then hold them responsible and liable and file claims in small cause courts. You will usually win in small cause court. Ask for other damages and you could end up getting more than original notary fee.
Non payment/ delayed payment has been going on too long and no one trusts a new comer.
Has done anything to change the system at it core and change the root cause of this bad practice ?
@SEBI
Sebastian: Can you explain your signing service business model here.
Are you yet another service that is going to to maximize signing agents commission & lowball notaries?
If you are willing to be different that other greedy notary signing services that scalp notaries, you are welcome !!
I am sorry to use such language. But I have very little respect for signing services and you may be noble soul.
Most signing services are like pimps stealing from and abusing their workers.
I am also a technology manager, have thought of rationally upending this business model and create a different and fair platform.
Again I apologize for this harsh words, but this is directed at the practices & fraud that still exists in the mortgage industry and signing services are stealing from notaries and no one is going to jail yet. Yes , not paying notary is theft of service. Many notaries don’t bother enforcing collection, police, courts etc, because the amount is probably under $1000 and they eat the loss & they rather be spending that time to recover that loss by working harder.
So these predatory signing services keep moving to a different market etc.
So kindly explain the below
What is your business model?
What is different about you company?
How fast will you pay notaries?
How much percentage is your notary hook-up commission?
How will you keep your cash flow separate from your operations? I want to ensure that you are financially strong & not use notaries payment to build business and then use a ponzi model to pay notaries forward.
Thanks for raising those questions. Please believe me when I am saying that one of the reasons that convinced me to start this company and product (besides finding it difficult for myself to find a notary) was when I realized how much discontent there’s currently with all signing company.
Look, in all fairness I don’t consider Signio a signing company - my goal for this platform is to be the place for consumers & business alike to get documents notarized (everything from PoA to Title&Mortgage)
As I’ve said it before, I’m a technology guy, that’s built companies before and one thing I know is that being open and working with the suppliers of any marketplace will get you way further in the game than trying to exploit them. Think about it - that’s why I proactively engaged in this conversation - I want to really understand what’s broken with this market and how our company could help fix it.
I would love to have Signio replace all these local and shady Signing services that work with big Title Co’s and offer a clear transparent model. Now that said and to your questions:
Ideally we would charge a commission of ~25% on all transactions that go through our platform. Be that for a PoA that’s 60 USD or signing a package that’s 200 USD. I’m saying ideally because right now we don’t process any payment, and we don’t take anything - so all notarizations that we’re trying to attract are charged 100% by the notaries. We really want to be the company that changes this industry - we’re in this for the long run so instead of being greedy and trying to make a lot of money right now I’m spending time with notaries and businesses that need them trying to iterate on the product.
I know signing jobs are usually scheduled ahead of time - however for all the other notarizations that are needed by customers in various other contexts we’re looking to use a platform and a mobile app to match demand and offer in real time based on proximity. Wouldn’t it be great if you could walk across the street and do a 50 USD notarization that’s ready in 30 minutes rather then driving for 1 hour just to get to your customer? That’s something new for this industry - think of it as an Uber like model…and I do believe it makes a lot of sense for notaries and customers alike.
When we will start processing orders ourselves - the money will hit our account in about 1 week from when the transaction was completed. The first thing after that is to write a cheque for the notary. I cannot imagine a scenario in which a notary is not paid for his /her job. I had no idea these things happen in this industry - and please believe me when I’m saying I find this to be unacceptable and condemnable
I believe I answered this at point 1. If you’re referring to something else please explain. Besides the transaction commission we’re not planning on charging anything else to anyone.
I’ve started this company with some angel funding so I’m aiming to use that until we become cashflow positive. That said - I don’t have all the details but I’m 100% honest when I say I will never make immoral or illegal use of a notary’s services to further my company.
I hope my explanations and good intentions have come across clearly - I am still learning a lot about your industry - so if you can help in any way I would me more than grateful.
Notaries don’t choose the signing technology for notarized documents. In the case of real estate transactions, the government office where the deed or similar document will be recorded dictates the acceptable technologies. Probably the majority of lenders and trust companies require that some additional documents be notarized too, so those lenders and trust companies will dictate the signing technologies for those. You’re wasting your time pitching your company to notaries; it isn’t up to notaries to adopt your technology or not.
For lenders and title companies, most of the potential benefit of electronic notarization is not the notarization itself, but the ability to bring the notarized documents within their IT infrastructure, so everything in these documents can be checked against the information in all their other IT resources, for example, the date of the signing and the exact spelling of the signer’s name.
Signio was dissolved in 2004. His web site usesign.io takes you to signio. usesign is a web site not his company name. Signio is a spinoff of Telepat.io (foreign stock) CEO is Sebastian Vaduva.
according to sebastion, signio is a platform and the name just happens to be the same name of signio. his company name is telepat.io. you decided for yourself is you wish to sign up with him.
upon further research and communicating with Sebastion, he still insists that signio is a platform. Telepat.io is the company name. The domain extension .io is british indian ocean territory. Per the Delaware Business Search, this is a foreign company approved to do business in Delaware. This ends my research on this guy and his business. Anyone interested in communicating with me further on this guy email me,
So far I am NOT happy with Signio. I signed up, downloaded the app, and have never, ever been able to sign into the app. I keep getting an error message that my sign in info is incorrect, even though it is the same info to sign in online, which I have done multiple times.
I have also completed my profile on Signio, TWICE, and both times it has disappeared.
I keep getting emails that there is work available, to please sign into the app…WHICH I CURRENTLY CANNOT DO AARRRRGGHHHH!
I have written to Sebastian multiple times, and so far, I have received one response where he said he was turning the issue over to his tech support…and nothing has been fixed.
Subject:
Re: Guest Post Pitch
From:
Sebastian Vaduva
Date: Sun, Oct 08, 2017 8:27 am
To: info@notarybeware.com
Linda,
There’s a name confusion.Signio is our platform ‘s name not our company If you will check our website’s footer you will see that the company is Telepat.io inc. We’re in good standing and have angel backing from AngelPad the best tech accelerator in the US.
I’d love to have a chance to speak to you and better explain what we’re working on and why this is beneficial for you.