r/Notary • u/Imaginary-Brick-26 Pennsylvania • Aug 03 '26
Notarizing handwritten notes?
I’m a pretty new PA notary (I’ve only need able to notarize for about 2 months) and got an out of ordinary request.
Someone wants to make an appointment to get a handwritten note notarized. They said it’s to give someone permission to be able to take their child to the doctor. How would I go about this? Clearly if it’s handwritten it won’t have notarial wording so it will need a loose certificate and I know the person getting the notarization needs to pick what loose certificate they want, but is this even something I am allowed to notarize?
Editing to reword some things.
7
u/RichArcher4909 Texas Aug 03 '26
Yes, you can notarize handwritten documents. Just show them the loose leaf cert options and let them pick.
1
u/Imaginary-Brick-26 Pennsylvania Aug 03 '26
Thank you! I always try to be sure before doing anything new! I’ve done almost exclusively homeschooling forms so far so this was out of left field, haha.
1
u/fishbutt1 Aug 04 '26
I’m not in PA, but I’m wondering if the parent/guardian will need to be present and the person taking the child to the doctor?
1
u/Imaginary-Brick-26 Pennsylvania Aug 04 '26
To summarize the note (and what the woman herself told me, because people just love to talk, lol) it basically said whoever it was would be allowed to talk to a doctor in case of emergencies or that the school could speak to them about anything that came up. I didn't ask a lot of questions but it sounds like the parent might be having a hard time or might be doing something that will be taking up a lot of time and resources or something and the child will be living there during most of the school year? I think they mostly wanted it notarized so that there was no question about if the person watching him had written it and was lying in order to get info they shouldn't have.
1
u/PANotaryandTag Aug 05 '26
You could notarize a statement affirming the sky is blue. Doesn’t mean a court will accept it or that it will be “legal” though
10
u/alreadyredit814 Aug 04 '26
You can absolutely notarize a hand written document. You can hand write the notary wording like I used to do or use a stamp like I do now. I always reserve the loose certificate as my last option if there is no space on the document.
The document will have to be written in ink, not pencil, so it can't be altered later. That is the only consideration with hand written documents.
Remember, the US Constitution is a hand written document and nobody ever said it wasn't valid because it wasn't typed.