Quick Guide: Texas Senate Bill 693 Notary Law Changes

Details

Category: Notary Blog

Published: Tuesday, 09 September 2025 14:01

📌 Applies To: Applications submitted on or after January 1, 2026

✅ What Notaries Need to Know

Education Requirements

• Beginning January 1, 2026, education will be mandatory for new and renewing notaries.
• Limited to 2 hours.
• Courses provided only by the Secretary of State (a reasonable fee may apply).
• Notaries commissioned for the first time before September 1, 2025 are exempt from retroactive training.

The exact details of the course and its implementation will be set by the Secretary of State by January 1, 2026. This change aligns Texas with other states that already require training to ensure notaries understand their duties and responsibilities.

Journal/Record Book Rules

• As always, making an entry in your journal/record book is required for every notarization.
• New – Notaries must keep their journal/record book in their possession until 10 years after the date of the last entry in the book.
• New – Failure to maintain a journal/record book is considered “good cause” for revoking an existing commission or rejecting an application for a new commission.

Personal Appearance

• Personal appearance is required for every notarization.
• For a notarization that is not an online notarization, “personal appearance” is defined as follows:
  • The person physically appears before the notary public at the time of the notarization in a manner that permits the notary public and the person to see, hear, communicate with, and provide proof of identification to each other
• Violations are a Class A misdemeanor. However, if the notarization involves the transfer of real property or any interest in real property, it becomes a state jail felony.

Protection from Fake IDs

• Notaries are protected from prosecution if they unknowingly rely on an apparently valid but fraudulent ID, as long as the signer personally appeared.