Guide
A scanback is a scanned copy of the signed document package that a notary signing agent sends electronically to the company that hired them, in addition to shipping the original wet-signed documents. It exists so a reviewer can catch a missing initial or an unstamped certificate the same day, while a correction is still cheap, rather than two days later when the paper arrives.
The questions below cover deadlines, equipment, what a reviewer is actually looking for, and the part that costs signing agents the most money: how much of the day a scanback order really takes. If you are working toward direct relationships with title companies, scanback turnaround is one of the things they quietly grade you on, which is covered in getting direct title company clients. For the calendar side of it, see sharing availability without sharing your calendar.
A scanback is a scanned copy of the signed document package, sent electronically to the company that hired you, on top of shipping the physical originals. The word gets used interchangeably with fax-backs, which is what the same step was called before scanning replaced faxing. It is not a substitute for returning the wet-signed documents. It is an extra copy, delivered faster than any courier can move paper.
To check the package before the originals are in a shipping envelope. A reviewer opens the scan and looks for the things that stop a file: a missing initial, a missing signature, an unsigned or unstamped notarial certificate, an unchecked box. If something is wrong and the scan shows it that afternoon, the fix is usually a short trip back or a corrected page. If nobody looks until the originals land two days later, the same mistake has cost the file two days. Funding and recording steps are often waiting on that review, which is why the request tends to come with a tight clock.
The hiring party sets the deadline, and it ranges from same-day to within a couple of hours of the appointment. Some orders ask you to scan at the signing table and wait for approval before you leave the signer. Some ask you to scan, hold the documents, and ship only after a reviewer signs off. Some ask you to scan and drop the package at the carrier the same day without waiting. Read that instruction before you accept, because those three patterns make very different claims on your afternoon.
The order normally says so before you accept it, and platforms that dispatch signings usually flag it on the order itself. If the instructions do not mention scanbacks, ask before you confirm rather than after. Pin down two things in the same message: the deadline, and whether you have to wait for approval before shipping. Companies differ on whether they pay anything extra for the added time, so if you charge for it, raise that when the order is offered, not once the documents are already printed.
A scanner that handles legal-size paper, at minimum. Loan packages mix letter and legal pages, and a scanner that only takes 8.5 by 11 will make you scan the legal pages one at a time, which is how a twenty-minute job becomes an hour. A sheet-fed desktop scanner covers most of the work. Notaries who accept scan-at-the-table orders generally carry a portable scanner, a laptop, and a hotspot, because the alternative is depending on a signer's home internet at seven in the evening.
Check with the company that hired you before you do. Loan packages carry Social Security numbers, account numbers, and full financial detail, and many title companies and signing services restrict how those pages may be scanned and transmitted, including rules against consumer cloud scanning apps. Public scanners are the clearer line: a copier at a shipping store or a library is not a place to run a borrower's package through. When a hiring party has a portal or a specified upload method, use it rather than emailing the file somewhere.
Yes, unless the hiring party tells you otherwise in writing. The scan is a preview for the reviewer; the wet-signed originals are still the documents of record and still have to travel. The order of operations is what trips up new signing agents. On a hold-for-approval order, shipping before the reviewer clears the scan defeats the point, because any correction they find is already sealed inside a courier envelope.
More than most people block for. Take a package that signs in 45 minutes: scanning it, checking the pages, uploading, waiting for a reviewer to respond, and getting to a drop-off can add another 45 to 90 minutes, and a hold-for-approval order can stretch further if the reviewer is busy. Those numbers are an illustration, not a measurement, and your own will differ by package size and equipment. The scheduling lesson holds either way. If your calendar shows a signing as a 45-minute block, you are advertising availability you do not have, and the next appointment you accept is the one you end up late for. Block the whole obligation, not the appointment.
No. NotaryBoard is scheduling and dispatch software: it shows agencies the free/busy availability of the notaries they work with and gets a signing onto the right notary's calendar. It does not receive, transmit, or store loan documents, and it does not sit between you and whatever portal your hiring party uses for document return. The part it does affect is the calendar. When a signing is accepted, the time goes on your calendar, and how much time you block, including the scanback and the drop-off, is what keeps the next request honest.