Terms & Conditions

1. Normal hours of business

Our notary office hours are 09.30 to 17.00 from Monday to Friday. In appropriate cases Giuseppe Santoro can arrange to see you outside his usual office hours, or away from the office. In such cases, he would charge a reasonable fee for travelling time plus the cost of travel (if that is material). 

We ask that all business is carried out on foot of a prior appointment (so that you do not waste time if Mr Santoro is unavailable for any reason at a particular time).

2. Responsibility

A notary’s first duty is to the transaction as a whole. Notarial acts are relied upon by clients, third parties and foreign governments and officials worldwide. Unless otherwise agreed in writing, a notary’s responsibility is limited to the Notarial formalities and does not extend to advice on or drafting of documentation or in relation to substantive legal input on the matter under consideration. Mr Santoro does not give foreign law advice.

3. Fees

Giuseppe Santoro's present hourly rate is €250.00 and his standard minimum fee is €60.00. Giuseppe Santoro reserves the right to vary these rates in respect of extremely urgent work or work done outside ordinary office hours or at the weekend. Mr Santoro offers fixed fees for certain common processes associated with the notarial process (such as attendance at the Department of Foreign Affairs for the purposes of obtaining an apostille certificate). Special factors which may affect the applicable fee include (without limitation): (1) complexity, difficulty or novelty; (2) skill, labour, specialised knowledge and responsibility; (3) time; (4) number and importance of documents prepared or reviewed; (5) place and circumstances in which the business or any part is done; (6) value of money or property involved; (7) importance of the matter to the client; (8) urgency, disruption, dislocation/re-arrangement of other work; (9) work undertaken out-of-office hours.

4. Payment

 Our charges are normally payable on presentation (usually at the meeting) by cash, cheque or by immediate electronic funds transfer. Notarised documents will not normally be released until all fees and disbursements have been paid in full.

5. Disbursements

You are responsible for all payments which Giuseppe Santoro makes on your behalf. Typical examples are legalisation fees paid to the Consular Section of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Foreign and Commonwealth Office and/or any consular, embassy, legalisation agents’ fees, Companies Registry fees, courier fees and special delivery postage charges. However, he will not incur these expenses without first obtaining your consent to do so.

6. Documentation to be prepared

Giuseppe Santoro may need more than one appointment to finalise the matter, particularly if it is necessary for him to prepare all or some of the documentation.

7. Proof of identity

Identification of individuals and proof of residential address is required. This is usually by way of a current passport, driving licence or national identity card and a recent gas, electricity or other bill or bank statement (by way of proof of address). Exceptionally, other proof may be acceptable.

If you act on behalf of a company, Giuseppe Santoro will need to establish that it exists and that the signatory has authority to represent it. He will generally conduct his own checks at the Companies Registration Office. In some cases he may ask you to produce a certificate of incorporation, good standing certificate or other similar evidence.

8. Written translation

In cases where Giuseppe Santoro does not have knowledge of the language in which the document is written, official translations may be required before and/or after execution of the documentation.

9. Limitation of liability

Save to the extent precluded by mandatorily applicable provisions of applicable law, Mr Santoro's liability for any loss, injury or damage of any nature whatsoever, whether direct or consequential, including (without limitation) in respect of negligence, breach of duty of care, breach of fiduciary duty or otherwise is limited to €1,000 in respect of any one claim or series of claims.

10.  Foreign law

Mr Santoro does not advise on foreign law and acts in an evidential, authentication capacity in relation to any matters involving the laws of any country or territory other than Ireland.

11.  Your own professional advice

In relation to certain transactions, you are expected to have taken advice from your own (a) Irish lawyer(s) and/or (b) relevant foreign lawyer(s), and/or (c) other competent professional advisers. You may potentially be taking a risk of relying on documents prepared by another party or its adviser(s), without yourself taking independent legal or other competent professional advice. If you have not done so, you may be advised to obtain advice from (a) Irish lawyer(s) and/or (b) relevant foreign lawyer(s), and/or (c) other competent professional advisers before the transaction proceeds. It is your responsibility to advise Mr Santoro if you have not taken appropriate professional advice as detailed above.

12. Complaints

Giuseppe Santoro aims to provide all clients with an efficient and high standard of service. However, in the unlikely event that you should wish to complain, then you should follow the complaints procedure set out below. Notaries are regulated by the Faculty of Notaries Public Faculty Office in Ireland, Website: www.notarypublic.ie.

If you are dissatisfied about the service you have received, please do not hesitate to contact Giuseppe Santoro. If he is unable to resolve the matter then you may complain to the Faculty of Notaries Public of which he is a member, who have a Complaints Procedure which is approved by the Faculty. This procedure is free to use and is designed to provide a quick resolution to any dispute.

13. Records

At the end of the matter, a formal entry of the main details of your transaction together with copies of the notarised document may be kept. In particular, when notaries are requested to certify documents such as public deeds, the above details will also be kept in their Notarial protocols.

14. Data protection

 Giuseppe Santoro uses the information you provide primarily for the provision of services to you and for related purposes including: updating and enhancing client records, analysis to help him manage his practice, statutory returns, legal and regulatory compliance. All records are held subject to his Privacy Notice which is published on www.dublin2notary.ie.

15. Anti-money laundering

Notaries are obliged under the Money Laundering Legislation to take measures to protect against fraud and forgery. To ensure that Mr Santoro complies with these obligations you acknowledge and agree that we may make all such enquiries as we deem necessary or appropriate, and you will provide us with such documents and information as we may request from time to time. Your failure to do so will entitle us to terminate any engagement and cease acting for you forthwith.

16. Equality, diversity & accessibility

We are committed to promoting equality and diversity in all of our dealings with clients and third parties. 

Regrettably our offices are not readily wheelchair accessible but Mr Santoro is willing to meet clients who are mobility-impaired at any Dublin city location convenient to them at no extra charge. We aim to overcome any other disabilities at no extra cost to the client.

16. Acknowledgement & Consent

It is a condition of our business that all clients will sign the following Acknowledgement & Consent and we will do our best to provide that to you for review in advance of attending at our offices for notarisation. 

17.  Governing law & jurisdiction

The law which governs our contract with you is Irish Law and it is agreed that any dispute relating to my services shall be resolved by the Irish courts.

Privacy Policy

Dublin 2 Notary respects your privacy and is committed to protecting your personal data. This Privacy Notice will inform you as to how we look after your personal data and tell you about your privacy rights and how the law protects you.

1.  Important information and who we are

Giuseppe Santoro, having his registered office at 8 Upper Mount Street, Dublin 2, D02 FT59 is the controller of your data. If you have any questions about this Privacy Notice, including any requests to exercise your legal rights, please contact info@dublin2notary.ie or call us directly.

You have the right to make a complaint at any time to the Office of the Data Protection Commission ("ODPC"), the Irish supervisory authority for data protection issues at info@dataprotection.ie. We would, however, appreciate the chance to deal with any concerns you may have before you approach the ODPC so please contact us in the first instance.

2.  The data we process about you

a.     Personal data, or personal information, means any information about an individual from which that person can be identified. It does not include data where the identity has been removed (anonymous data).

b.     We may use, store and transfer different kinds of personal data about you; including the retention of your personal data in compliance with the relevant anti-money laundering legislation, the relevant tax legislation and the rules and regulations governing Notaries Public.

 3.  Acquisition of your personal data

 Direct interactions. You may give us your personal data by filling in documents or by corresponding with us by post, phone, email, or otherwise. This includes personal data you provide when you: (a) contact us to obtain notary services; (b) submit an email query; (c) send us a document for notarisation; and/or (d) provide us with formal proof of your identity and postal address.

4.  How we use your personal data

 Lawful basis. We will only use your personal data when the law allows us to. Most commonly, we will use your personal data in the following circumstances where: (a) we need to perform the notary services as requested by you; (b) it is necessary for our legitimate interests (or those of a third party) and your interests and fundamental rights do not override those interests; (c) where we need to comply with a legal or regulatory obligation.

Purposes. The purposes for which we will use your personal data are as follows: (a) We will only use your personal data for the purposes for which you submitted it, unless we reasonably consider that we need to use it for another reason and that reason is compatible with the original purpose. If you wish to get an explanation as to how the processing for the new purpose is compatible with the original purpose, please contact us by email. (b) If we need to use your personal data for an unrelated purpose, we will notify you and we will explain the legal basis which allows us to do so. (c) Please note that we may process your personal data without your knowledge or consent, in compliance with the above rules, where this is required or permitted by law.

Disclosures. We may have to share your personal data with employees of the Notary Public that provide IT and system administration services, bookkeeping, marketing and other administrative services to us as well as with external third parties such as: 

A.  service providers based in the EEA who provide IT, hosting, payment and digital marketing services, third party logistic providers, and system administration services;

B.  professional advisers acting as processors including lawyers, bankers, auditors and insurers based in the EEA who provide consultancy, banking, legal, insurance and accounting services; and

C. the Revenue Commissioners in Ireland (or similar in other jurisdictions), supervisory authorities, regulators and other authorities acting as processors or joint controllers based in Ireland who require reporting of processing activities in certain circumstances.

 We require all third parties to respect the security of your personal data and to treat it in accordance with the law. We do not allow our third-party service providers to use your personal data for their own purposes and only permit them to process your personal data for specified purposes and in accordance with our instructions.

5.  Data security

We have put in place appropriate security measures to prevent your personal data from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed. In addition, we limit access to your personal data to those employees, agents, contractors and other third parties who have a business need to know. They will only process your personal data on our instructions and they are subject to a duty of confidentiality.

 We have put in place procedures to deal with any suspected personal data breach and will notify you and any applicable supervisory authority or other regulator of a breach where we are legally required to do so.

6.  Data retention

We will only retain your personal data for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes you submitted it for, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, accounting, or reporting requirements, or to defend legal proceedings connected to the data.

To determine the appropriate retention period for personal data, we consider the amount, nature, and sensitivity of the personal data, the potential risk of harm from unauthorised use or disclosure of your personal data, the purposes for which we process your personal data and whether we can achieve those purposes through other means, and the applicable legal requirements.

We have to keep basic information about you (including contact and proof of identity data) for six years. In some circumstances you can ask us to delete your data: see below for further information or contact us by email. 

 7.  Your legal rights

Under certain circumstances, you have rights at law in relation to your personal data, to: 

A.     Request access: to your personal data (commonly known as a "data subject access request"). This enables you to receive a copy of the personal data we hold about you and to check that we are lawfully processing it. Normally all this is provided to you at the time the professional service is being provided.

B.     Request correction: of the personal data that we hold about you. This enables you to have any incomplete or inaccurate data we hold about you corrected, though we may need to verify the accuracy of the new data you provide to us.

C.     Request erasure: of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to delete or remove personal data where there is no good reason for us continuing to process it. You also have the right to ask us to delete or remove your personal data where you have successfully exercised your right to object to processing (see below), where we may have processed your information unlawfully or where we are required to erase your personal data to comply with local law. Note, however, that we may not always be able to comply with your request of erasure for specific legal reasons which will be notified to you, if applicable, at the time of your request.

D.     Object to processing: of your personal data where we are relying on a legitimate interest (or those of a third party) and there is something about your particular situation which makes you want to object to processing on this ground as you feel it impacts on your fundamental rights and freedoms. You also have the right to object where we are processing your personal data for direct marketing purposes. In some cases, we may demonstrate that we have a compelling legitimate ground to process your information which overrides your rights and freedoms.

E.     Request restriction of processing: of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to suspend the processing of your personal data in the following scenarios: (a) if you want us to establish the data's accuracy; (b) where our use of the data is unlawful but you do not want us to erase it; (c) where you need us to hold the data even if we no longer require it as you need it to establish, exercise or defend legal claims; or (d) you have objected to our use of your data but we need to verify whether we have overriding legitimate grounds to use it.

F.     Request the transfer: of your personal data to you or to a third party. We will provide to you, or a third party you have chosen, your personal data in a structured, commonly used, machine-readable format. Note that this right only applies to automated information which you initially provided consent for us to use or where we used the information to perform a contract with you.

G.     Withdraw consent at any time: where we are relying on consent to process your personal data. However, this will not affect the lawfulness of any processing carried out before you withdraw your consent. If you withdraw your consent, we may not be able to provide certain offerings to you. We will advise you if this is the case at the time you withdraw your consent.

 If you wish to exercise any of the rights set out above, please contact us by email in the first instance. 

You will not have to pay a fee to access your personal data (or to exercise any of the other rights). However, we may also charge a reasonable professional fee if your request is clearly unfounded, repetitive or excessive. Alternatively, we may refuse to comply with your request in these circumstances.

We may need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity and ensure your right to access your personal data (or to exercise any of your other rights). This is a security measure to ensure that personal data is not disclosed to any person who has no right to receive it. We may also contact you to ask you for further information in relation to your request to speed up our response. 

We try to respond to all legitimate requests within one month. Occasionally it may take us longer than a month if your request is particularly complex or you have made a number of requests. In this case, we will notify you and keep you updated.