The president of the Notary Chamber: The most awful thing is to stay with a goose-quill by a dusty notary book
More and more services are transferred into electronic space. The notions of e-democracy, e-authorities, e-society are used more and more frequently in public discussions, although transition to „е.“ In Lithuania is not so rapid as, for example, in Estonia which is considered to be the first country to introduce internet voting during national elections. This time INFOLEX is focusing on e-notariat about which we are talking with the president of the Notary Chamber, a Klaipeda notary Marius Stračkaitis.
INFOLEX: How far has Lithuania gotten from the point of view of e-notariat, as compared with foreign countries?
M. Stračkaitis: Notaries‘ entering electronic space is natural and inevitable. As a part of European notariat we participate in corresponding processes of creation of e-society. Notary Board of the European Union, in cooperation with the European Committee and notaries from some countries is already working on a number of projects connected with exchange of professional information and distribution of information about availability of notary services.
European Notarial Network where notaries from EU countries provide requests connected with notary practice and procedures have been working for several years. Lithuanian notaries are among the most active users of this system. In spring, 2010, an informational site on hereditary rights in 27 European countries successions-europe.eu. started. Here you can find the most detailed information about regulation of succession in Lithuania as well. This year the priority of Austria holding the presidency of the notarial board of European Union is implementation of a project of creation of a European notaries catalogue. A similar project on information about spouses‘ property and legal information is also under way.
Electronics progress of certain notariats is determined by a number of factors, suchh is range of internet services, development of electronic registrines, legal enactments. In Estonia there has existed for many years an e-notariat system allowing to incorporate a legal entity, Austria since 2000 has been proud for an electronic notarial documents archive cyberDOC. There are other successful projects of electronic notariat.
Having taken a view of Lithuania, we have realized that informational society‘s progress creates prerequisites for Lithuanian notariat to act more actively in the electronic sphere. Together with the Registry Center in July, 2009, a Public Electronics Service of Deals with Immovable Property (NETSVEP) was introduced in bureaus – a huge source of experience. At present notaries place their suggestions and comments for the Electronics Service of Registration of Legal Entities (JAREP) being created by the Registry Center. Notaries shall interact with the Central Hypothec System via the system of Service of Preparation and Registration of Hypothec and Mortgage (HISREP). These are modern projects of cooperation of state institutions and our professional association in keeping with the spirit of e-society and e-authorities.
INFOLEX: Which notary services exist in electronic format now and what are you planning to transfer to electronic space in future?
M. Stračkaitis: Such systems as NETSVEP or similar to it JAREP, HISREP presupposing registration of legal entities and deals with hypothec are inevitable. In a year and a half after launching NETSVEP in bureaus this system is used by absolute majority of notaries. As I have already mentioned, participating in a complex process of creation of NETSVEP we have acquired valuable experience which we use in other projects. I would like to be optimistic and to hope that the state shall pay attention to our future works. If state institutions had looked upon creation of e-notariat in a statesmanlike way, and not from the point of view of interests of separate parties of groups, some legal enactments determining status of European support recipients should have been changed. Foru s this would have created a possibility to implement this project quicker and better, without partners „developing“ funds and other resources.
We have started with seemingly small, although ambitious projects. At an order ofthe Notary Chamber a unique system of document management was created. All the newly issued, received, sent documents are managed and duly archived electronically. One may follow the course of forming, filling and correcting of each documents, to give tasks for employees and control their actions. Documents may be certified with electronic signatures of all regulated formats. According to modern functionality requirements we have updated internal site of the Notary Chamber. There notaries and bureau employees very easily find information starting from the year 2003, there is a flexible and efficient document search system. During creation of these systems we have developed a system of registries. Limits of their development in the future shall be determined solesly by our needs, while techincal possibilities, I take the liberty of stating, are unlimited. Should we need it and should circumstances demand so, our system of registrines may turn into a national electronic notarial archive. Of course, we look upon all our investments and visions responsibly and soberly. We are going to make decisions taking into consideration compatibility of our system with the state‘s legal system, its registries. For experts working in the sphere of informational technologies we have given our vision of electronic notariat. We seek to preserve legal control of a notary even when all our environment and routine is moved to electronic space, and the way to reach this goal is to create an electronic notarial service, a convenient and reliable access for clients, to integrate all this with the electronic archive.
INFOLEX: You have mentioned that „the NETSVEP system is one of the biggest disappointments of digital epoch created without taking into consideration of needs either of notaries or of clients.“ What do notaries complain of and what is the prospect of using the system?
M. Stračkaitis: I said that in 2009. During the first months of introduction of NETSVEP system the situation was exactly like this. Unortunately for the Notary Chamber, several years ago, when the said state systems were created, needs of notaries were not taken into consideration. We were able to joint the process of improvement of NETSVEP only on the final stage, when the system’s „skeleton“ had already been formed. This is why now this system firsst of all satisfies needs of information recipient and not of a client or a notary actually generating this data.
And still I would like to stress positive moments. For two years of everyday work with the Registry Center we have moved really far. One of the most significant achievements is not that the system has been improved, some problems have been eliminated, but that the clients have understood that a notary and a computer are inseparable. Some notaries have become NETSVEP experts, while others log in only to request and receive certificates for a registry necessary for a certain a deal. I keep saying: so far the system is not „friendly“ and not handy for a user, it is still unreliable, but it does not have an alternative. The more intensively notaries will use NETSVEP, the quicker the system‘s acquirer Registry Center and its contractors will be able to eliminate its defects.
Having learned from the process of creation of NETSVEP, when notaries till the final stage had only a consultative role, in the process of creation of An Electronic Service of Registration of Legal Entities (JAREP) we are more active and aggressive. It‘s a pity that recently we have seen new signs of „departamental interestsand pressure of the interested groups. A new provision was included into the project of amendments of Regulations on Registry of Immovable Property reading that „deals with immovable property are prepared using information system of public electronic service of deals with immovable property“. Thus, the project suggests to set forth an obligation to prepare all deals with immovable property only using the NETSVEP system. Whatever the improvements we make to the NETSVEP system may be, it would still be impossible to prepare absolutely all the deals with immovable property using this system for objective reasons. NETSVEP is a formalized system designed for conclusion of standard, simple deals with immovable property, although it would be impossible to conclude comples, non-standard deals with immovable property using NETSVEP system, therefore there will always be a need for alternative possibility to conclude deals not through NETSVEP. If the only possibility to prepare deals is established, i.e. only through NETSVEP, situations may happen quite often when notaries will not be able to prepare and certify deals with immovable property due to technical problems, for example, due to defects or errors of the NETSVEP system iteslf, due to internet communication providing failures, etc. In this case there would be a considerable dissatisfaction of clients with the fact that a notary during the system failures is not able to render notarial services.
INFOLEX: Do you think the process of transfer of services to electronic space is always welcome? Does anyone evaluate „technical“ risks (e.g., power failures, possible breakdowns of data protection, etc.)?
M. Stračkaitis: Information society has introduced a lot of dangers into various spheres of life, although dangers encourage also the process of safety technologies. The most awful thing, to my mind, is to stay with a goos-quill by a dusty notary book. If we do not occupy this niche, it shall be occupied by others who do not necessarity take into account essential things and only striving to „spend“ the project’s funds. Let me repeat that by creating e-notariat we are seeking to preserve somthing very important – a direct contact of a notary with his client. Все прочее All the rest is just a question of choosing the right technical solution. It is obvious that for the last several years possibilities of personal identification have expanded: they include electronic banking, electronic signature, iris and other biometrical data, other means of idenitification. Legality of an electronic deal is based first of all not on technical means which are constantly in progress buto n a notary‘s legal supervision. Reliability of notariat systmem in our country, as well as latin notariat in the world is 99 per cent. This ensures especially bright prospects for the e-notariat project.
INFOLEX: Thank you for the interview.