Is Working as a “Notary Signing Agent” permissible?

Question:

I am living in USA and working as a “Notary Signing Agent” , an independent contractor certified by National Notary Association, USA, for the Home Loan borrower. My responsibility explicitly includes:

Receiving the Documents from the Signing Service companies.
Communicating with the borrower about the required signature on the related documents.
Meeting Borrower to have their signature on some documents and notarize some documents ( as required).
Sending back the borrower completed document to the Lender.

Up to this point my job is done. I am paid based on the distance  I traveled and volume of the documents I needed to get the borrower signature on and notarized the docs.

After I send all the document back to the Signing Service companies a “Loan Settlement Agent”  disburse the loan to borrower. But, if borrower want to cancel the loan, he/she can do so in next three days.

My questions are :

Am  I directly or indirectly involved in interest based transaction?
Is my income from the signing assignment Halal or Haram?

Further information on my job description are:

• I don’t sell the Home Loan product by any means
• I am only having the borrower sign in some documents already prepared by the lender and approached by loan officer.
• I am not authorized to even explain any term and condition (e.g; APR, Interest rate, Monthly payment, closing cost etc). These are the responsibilities of Loan closing/settlement agent(Loan officer).
• I am a notary public only.
• Loan already been approved or refinanced by lender.

Hope I have provided enough information to make my responsibilities and position clear.

Answer:

In the Name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful.
As-salāmu ‘alaykum wa-rahmatullāhi wa-barakātuh.

In principle while working as an aid in some contract, a person might act as an active participant or a facilitator to the contract. One’s position and job description will determine whether his assistance towards that job is an essential active component for the deal/contract to formulate, or the involvement is merely an external facilitating assistance.

An active participant would be such a person, who is positioned in the cycle of the transaction, absence of whom would render the contract incomplete. With the information provided by your kind self, we understand that while you do not conduct this deal, yet your involvement is an integral component for the completion of the deal. Should you not take these documents to the beneficiary to be signed, the transaction would not complete.

While an external assistance to a transaction is such assistance which does not affect the transaction itself, rather it helps in peripherals attached to the transaction like delivery of the documentation after it has been already signed.

In view of above job description you have provided the job of “ Notary Signing Agent” falls under direct assistance towards an interest bearing transaction, and hence impermissible. Allah Ta’ala has mentioned in the Qur’an,

وَلَا تَعَاوَنُوا عَلَى الْإِثْمِ

…and do to assist in sin…(Qur’an 5:2)

We advise you to seek other means of earning, seeking pleasure of Allah.

May Allah help and assist you in your struggle to earn halal income, Ameen.

And Allah Ta’āla Knows Best

Mufti Faisal bin Abdul Hameed al-Mahmudi
Darul Iftaa wal Irshaad, Montreal
www.fatwa.ca

Concurred by,
Mufti Faraz ibn Adam
www.darulfiqh.com