Appearance
Identity Verification
NotariseIt verifies every notary twice: once for the commission, and once for the person holding it.
Approval confirms that your notarial commission is real — your Supreme Court Number checked against the Nigerian Notary Public registry, your credentials reviewed. Identity verification confirms that you are the person that commission belongs to. Both are required before you can take work on the platform, and both are visible to the clients who choose you.
Why we ask
A client choosing a notary on NotariseIt is trusting a stranger with a legal instrument. "This notary's commission is genuine" and "this notary is who they say they are" are two different assurances, and only one of them can be answered by a registry lookup.
What you need
One government-issued ID. Any of:
| ID | What we check |
|---|---|
| NIN (National Identification Number) | Preferred — the fastest to verify |
| International passport | Passport number and surname |
| Driver's licence | Licence number |
Only a one-way hash of the number is kept. The number itself is not stored, and it is never shown to clients.
Doing it
Dashboard → Profile Settings → Identity Verification, or from the prompt on your dashboard. Choose an ID type, enter the number, and the check runs immediately. Most complete in a few seconds.
If a check fails, the reason is shown against that ID and you can try another type. A failed check is not a mark against you; mistyped numbers are the usual cause.
What it unlocks
Until your identity is verified, you will not appear in notary search and cannot start a session. Once verified, both happen at once — there is nothing further to wait for.
Your digital seal is the other requirement. The two are independent, so you can do them in either order, and your dashboard shows which are outstanding.
A payout account is not one of the requirements
You can work without one. NotariseIt holds your earnings and releases them as soon as you add a bank account — see Earnings & Payouts.
Rechecking, once a year
Your ID does not expire — our check does
A NIN is issued for life, and your passport or licence number belongs to you for as long as the document does. What lapses is NotariseIt's own verification: we confirm your identity once a year so a client booking you today is relying on a recent check, not one from several years ago. You are not being asked to renew a national identity number.
The check lasts twelve months from the day you complete it — not from the day you registered. NotariseIt reminds you well ahead of time:
| When | What happens |
|---|---|
| 60 days before | First reminder by email |
| 30 days before | Second reminder |
| 7 days before | Final reminder, plus a notice on your dashboard |
| The day it lapses | You are told the check has run out |
| Monthly after that | Until you renew |
Rechecking is the same few minutes as the first time, with the same ID.
If you let the check lapse
You stop appearing in notary search and cannot start new sessions.
Sessions already in your diary are not affected and will go ahead as booked. Your clients did nothing wrong, and we are not going to cancel their appointments. Rechecking restores everything immediately — there is no review and no waiting.
Clients are verified before they can book you
A client's verification also lasts a year, and it is a condition of booking on NotariseIt: a client cannot book a session or pay for one without a current verified identity check, and cannot start one either.
That does not remove your decision under s.6(3)(c) of the Notaries Public Act 2023 — you still satisfy yourself on camera who you are dealing with, and you still record it. What it removes is the case where you discover a problem with someone's identity after an hour of your diary has already been spent on them.
Who can book you
Every client who books you has a current verified identity check. There is no setting for this and nothing to switch on — it is how the platform works.
There used to be one, Who Can Book You, which let you require verified clients for your own diary while others took anyone. It has been removed: with verification required of everyone, the setting described a choice that no longer exists, and an option that does nothing is worse than no option.
One case where a client is not verified at booking
If the identity provider is unavailable when a client tries to verify, we let their booking go ahead rather than punish them for our supplier being down, and we chase them to finish the check as soon as it is working.
Those are the only bookings that can reach you unverified, and the session will not start until the check completes. You will see the outstanding check in the session's verification panel.
Your data
Identity checks are run by Dojah, a Nigerian identity provider. NotariseIt keeps the result of the check, the type of ID, the date, and a one-way hash of the number — never the number itself. See Data & Privacy for retention periods.