Overview

An in-depth guide on how to send a notarization request from the Proof Business Platform. Learn how to send a notarization request, see the signer experience, and get a glimpse of accessing and downloading the completed documents.

🎯Primary Audience: Proof for Business

Contents

Part I: Your Experience

Step 1: Log In

1. Log in to your Proof account.
2. Click Send & manage from the navigation panel on the left:
   • If you don't see the panel, click the caret to expand it.
3. Click Send new transaction
4. Select Notarization Request.

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Step 2: Provide Transaction Details

Transaction details

• Name the transaction.
• Select the appropriate radio button (Yes or No) depending on if the document requires a secondary ID. 

Recipient details

• Signer's full name: The recipient may not be able to change their name when they proceed through the transaction, depending on the settings in your account.
• Signer's email address: This is required.
• Phone number: If provided, the signer will receive a text message with a link to complete the transaction.
• Address: If provided, the signer's address populates automatically when they are verifying their identity. The signer can edit the address later if needed.

Additional recipients

Click the Add recipient button and select the appropriate option, if your document requires multiple signers. Transactions with multiple signers have several options for meeting with a notary; read Multiple Signer Transactions for more details.

The number of signers you can add depends on other parties required for the transaction. 

Options

Signing order: If your signers need to sign the document in a specific order, you can indicate this in during transaction creation.

Group signing: If you have a transaction that can be executed by anyone from a group of people in your organization, you can send the transaction to a shared inbox, and whoever has access to the inbox and is available for the meeting can sign the document on the organization's behalf.

Representative signer: If a signer is signing on behalf of someone else or a business entity, you can mark them as such when you send out the transaction.

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Step 3: Upload your Document

1. 1. Under the Document Upload section, drag and drop your document into the box or click Upload a Document to open the document selector.
   2. Select your document(s) and click the Add Document to Transaction button on the lower right:
      • To upload additional documents, click the Add Documents button on the upper left of your document list and repeat the process.
   3. Once the documents are uploaded, click the icons to the right to toggle the requirements on or off for your document. Hover over the icons to see a description of what each icon represents.

Explanation of Document Requirements Icons

• Notarization Required: This must be toggled ON for notarization requests. If this requirement is off, the transaction cannot be sent. 
• Signer Can Fill In Document: This allows for the signer to fill in the document before the notary meeting. They can also complete any Fill in Here flags in the document. The signer won't be able to sign the document or complete any action item that is required to be done in the presence of a notary.
• Additional Witness Required: You can toggle this on if your document requires additional witnesses.
• ℹ️ The signer’s witness must be in the same location as the signer at the time of the notarization meeting, unless remote witnessing can be used. Read more about witnesses here.

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Step 4: Prepare your Document

1. 1. Click the Fill Out Document button in the upper left to prepare your document for the signer.
   2. In the toolbar on right, click and drag the Sign Here flag to the spot on the document where you want to drop the flag.
   3. Repeat with Fill In Here or additional flags as necessary.
   4. Once finished, click the Save & Close button on the right.

Read Tagging Your Documents for more details.

If you need to change the original document after tagging it, you can replace it, similar to how you Replace a Prepared Document.

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Step 5: Email your Document

1. Scroll down to the Custom Email section to add an optional personalized message for your signer.
2. Click Preview Email to review and ensure the appropriate fields populate (your name, business name, logo, and message).
3. Scroll down to Notary Notes to provide information to the notary who answers the call or leave the radio button for No selected if you choose not to use this feature:
   • This note goes to the notary at the beginning of the notarization meeting; you can add any instructions that you want to communicate to the notary here. For example, you may want to leave a note if the document needs 2 forms of identification or additional witnesses.
4. Select the payment method if you want to change it from the default setting.
5. Scroll down and click Send Transaction to email your signer(s).

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Signer Experience

Please see the articles below for details about the signer's experience and process:

• Sign a Document Sent to You by a Business Using Proof - How signers view and sign documents and how to join a call with a notary.
  
  
• Proof uses Multi-Step Verification for identity verification of signers. This includes Knowledge-based Authentication (KBA) or Credible Identifying Witness, followed by Credential Analysis:
  
  • If you are utilizing an In-House Notary, signers can skip KBA and Credential Analysis if the notary completing the transaction personally knows the signer. This is not an option if you use the Notarize Network, including any call that is transferred to the on-demand queue via Overflow.
    
    
• How Do I Share My Notarized Document? - Learn how signers can share and access completed, notarized documents immediately after the meeting or through email.

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After the Notary Meeting

Access the notarized document

You will receive an email notifying you of the notary completion with a subject line that says, "A notarized document is ready to review." 

1. 1. Click the blue Log in to Proof button in the email to access the notarized document.
   2. Once in your Proof account, click the Send & Manage tab at the top of your dashboard.
   3. Find and click the name of the transaction you'd like to access.
   4. In the Transaction Details pop-up window, click the Document tab at the top to download the document.

Transaction Details

The Transaction Details window contains 7 sections (tabs):

• Summary: An overview of the transaction, including the internal Proof ID/Transaction ID and the details you entered when building the transaction:
  • The transaction will show your chosen payment method.
• Signer: The signer's information and if they passed the ID verification process.
• Notary: The information for the notary who notarized the document for this specific transaction.
• Video: The video of the notarization meeting between the signer and the notary (download the video by clicking the three vertical dots in the bottom right corner of the screen)
• Document: The notarized document(s) and other supplementary documents from the meeting (click the document name to download a specific document, or click the Download All to download all the documents on this page)
  • Supplementary Documents: Additional documents to use as a resource. For example:
    • Audit Trail: Detailed audit trail of the transaction, including the emails addresses to which the document was sent (for transactions completed after July 2023)
    • Proof Verification Instructions: Displays a Unique Proof ID and access PIN to authenticate your document if needed
    • State-Specific Legal Information: An article that describes the legal requirements of remote online notarization
• History: A timeline of the notarization from when you sent the transaction to the signer to the notary meeting being completed
• Notes: Any notary notes you typed when creating the transaction

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Support

Feel free to reach out to our Support team if you need help!

• Chat: Click the icon in the corner of your screen:
  • Monday – Friday: 8 am – 10 pm ET
  • Saturday – Sunday: 8 am – 7 pm ET
• Email: support@proof.com
• Phone: Available depending on your subscription

Notaries are available 24/7/365!

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