Notary Public Handbook - California Page 12
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4810
GENERAL INFORMATION
The sequential journal is the exclusive property of the notary public and shall not be
surrendered to an employer upon termination of employment, whether or not the employer
paid for the journal, or at any other time. The circumstances in which the notary public must
relinquish the journal or permit inspection and copying of journal transactions and the procedures
the notary public must follow are specified in Government Code section 8206(d).
A notary public is guilty of a misdemeanor if the notary public willfully fails to properly
maintain the notary public’s journal. (Government Code section 8228.1)
Within 30 days from the date the notary public commission is no longer valid, the notary
public must deliver all notarial journals, records and papers to the county clerk’s office where
the oath is on file. If the notary public willfully fails or refuses to do so, the notary public is
guilty of a misdemeanor, and shall be personally liable for damages to any person injured by
that action or inaction. (Government Code section 8209) Any notarial journals, records and
papers delivered to the Secretary of State will be returned to the sender.
CONFLICT OF INTEREST
A notary public is not prohibited from notarizing for relatives or others, unless doing so
would provide a direct financial or beneficial interest to the notary public. With California’s
community property law, care should be exercised if notarizing for a spouse or a domestic
partner.
A notary public would have a direct financial or beneficial interest to a transaction in the
following situations: (Government Code section 8224)
• If a notary public is named, individually, as a principal to a financial transaction.
• If a notary public is named, individually, as any of the following to a real property
transaction: beneficiary, grantor, grantee, mortgagor, mortgagee, trustor, trustee, vendor,
vendee, lessor, or lessee.
A notary public does not have a direct financial or beneficial interest in a transaction if a
notary is acting in the capacity of an agent, employee, insurer, attorney, escrow, or lender for a
person having a direct financial or beneficial interest in the transaction.
If in doubt as to whether or not to notarize, it is recommended that you seek the advice of an
attorney.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The form most frequently completed by the notary public is the certificate of acknowledgment.
The certificate of acknowledgment must be in the form set forth in Civil Code section 1189. In
the certificate of acknowledgment, the notary public certifies:
1. That the signer personally appeared before the notary public on the date indicated in
the county indicated.
2. To the identity of the signer.
3. That the signer acknowledged executing the document.
The notary public sequential journal must contain a statement as to whether the identity of a
person making the acknowledgment or taking the oath or affirmation was based on personal
knowledge or satisfactory evidence. If identity was established based on satisfactory evidence,
then the journal shall contain the signature of the credible witness swearing or affirming to the
identity of the individual or the type of identifying document used to establish the person’s
identity, the governmental agency issuing the document, the serial or identifying number of
the document, and the date of issue or expiration of the document. If the identity of the person
making the acknowledgment or taking the oath or affirmation was established by the oaths or
affirmations of two credible witnesses whose identities are proven upon the presentation of
satisfactory evidence, then the journal shall contain the type of identifying documents, the
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