I’ve had several companies say they want scanbacks because they don’t trust Fedex and UPS to deliver on time. So the signing agent pays for the shipper’s inefficiencies by doing extra work for no extra pay.
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I guess I’m not understanding the extra cost for scanbacks.
My UPS and FedEx do it for free. Their not using any paper. Their just scanning the documents. They put the docs on the scanner and hit scan. They go do other work helping customers and come back when the scanning is completed. They email it to me or they will upload the docs to the USB I provide them.
When approval is required before shipping the docs. I upload the docs to whichever website while at UPS or FedEx then I get almost an immediate approval to ship the documents.
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I am not sure what is going on in the industry right now but last year out of the 100’s of signings I did less that 20% of them required scanbacks. NOW in 2023 90% of the orders I get require scanbacks… Which is not a major issue for me… but I’m just curious as to why all of a sudden the change?
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I would guess that title companies competing for less work are determined not to provide signed packages that contain errors back to their lender clients.
In 2020 and 2021, different circumstances made lenders more tolerant of re-signs. Now lenders are also scrambling to stay afloat. Ergo they are demanding fast, accurate closings from their title companies. Title companies respond by providing a short lead time on assignments and requiring scans back to verify correct completion of the signing package before sending it on to the lender.
That would be my guess.
@judikidd Agreed!
Plus, even more so over the past few years the ever-present downward pressure on fees (generally resulting in the less experienced accepting the Signing Order), coupled along with judikidd’s point above (and possibly some additional elements) they’ve probably been witness to “more errors” within the executed packages.
The following adages come to mind:
"You get what you pay for . . . "
“If you pay peanuts, you get monkeys.”
@donaldsonnp My guess would be that in the last couple years they took on so may new notaries and experienced so many mistakes in their packages that they are now finally realizing they need to do damage control. But that’s just my guess.
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@anthonywwebb01 all due respect, but you should not be handing anyone’s closing documents off to anyone for scanning - you should be doing it yourself. This is such a breach of privacy it defies words.
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@LindaH-FL Absolutely! Concur 
percent.
When coupled with the machine memory capacity & length of storage for equipment at those businesses, certainly not a wise move to have UPS/FedEx, etc. to scan . . .
For more information on equipment memory, see the following post:
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Your reactions are overly dramatic. I disagree for several reasons.
Not all notaries live and work in urban areas with quick and easy access to all the services and the self help services they need to complete a signing.
Notaries do live and work in rural areas where the services needed to complete a signing are limited and far apart. Also the operating hours for many business are much shorter. The distance from the signing location to the nearest and/or only UPS/FedEx can require to drive an extra 30 to 60 minutes one way.
I’m going to leave it there. I’m not going to go 15 rounds about this topic.
You just described my demographics to a tee – no FedEx/UPS boxes in my little town resulting in a 30 minute trip one way to drop package, 2.5 miles down a dirt road to get to a paved road, winding country roads, unlit backroad river ramps, 300 foot frontage on properties with no lights lit - I can go on and on
I did all my own scanning and NEVER left borrowers’ personal info in the hands of anyone else. I’ll leave this right here - Epson GT-S50.
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It’s because there are no refi appts, so if it’s only purchase business they need scans for funding and recording.
I agree. Shipping damages and losses are impacting the rise of scanbacks. Two weeks ago I was called by a Title company for a Refi I did, and was told that they hadn’t received the Fedex package. They were tracking it and could see that it was stuck in Atlanta for 2 days. I didn’t have to provide scanbacks for that job, but I was asked if I happened to have scanned it anyway. Of course I didn’t. I was then asked if I could get the package re-signed and backdate everything to 3 days prior. I couldn’t help them there either because I can’t backdate my Notary certificates. I know they were trying to salvage the job for the lender. They are now going to ask everyone to do scanbacks.
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If they are not paying over $100 I do not accept jobs that ask for scanbacks. The money being paid does not equal the time you are putting into the job.
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I live rurally. I have a printer that scans. I simply communicate to the hiring person that if I have to return to the office to scan, same day ship may not be possible. It’s never been an issue.
Many companies after error free scans stop requiring scans.
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