If you're buying a home and your title company happens to be ORTC in Pleasanton, run for the hills...or just choose a BETTER title company.
When we had to sign our escrow documents, my husband's name was spelled incorrectly on pretty much all of them. We told the notary about the mistakes and she said not to worry about it. Just cross it out, write his name correctly, and initial.
Our grant deed gets recorded by the county and what do you know...my husband's name is spelled incorrectly.
We notified Kimberlin (however you spell her name) at ORTC, since she's the one we had been in contact with. She said she would get it done and it would be on their dime and that they would do everything in their power to accommodate us since it was their mistake. She said she would have a notary come to our house, have us sign the addendum and new grant deed, and be on our way. That didn't happen over the weekend like she said it would.
I reached out to her the following week and she said that they were trying to find someone in our area to swing by and that a notary was also doing another job in the area, so she could have that person come and see us.
I DID NOT HEAR FROM KIMBERLIN FOR 2 WEEKS.
I had to reach out to her (notice a pattern) in order to light a fire under her @$$. I told her we needed this done because it was affecting the refinance we were trying to get! It was causing a chain reaction because if we didn't get it fixed, my husband's name would carry over incorrectly on all of our future documents.
I told her we had open availability that day (Friday) as well as the entire weekend. She said she would call me back soon to let me know when a notary would come by. I didn't hear from her for a couple hours, so I called her back. She answered the phone with, "I was just about to call you!" and that wasn't the first time she had answered her calls that way. If you were just about to call me...then why didn't you?!
She FINALLY set someone up to come over to our house, scheduled for the next day at 9AM. She noted that since it was a holiday weekend, that they would submit the documents to the county on Tuesday and it should be recorded by Wednesday.
The notary came on-time. He was polite and helpful, did his job well. No problems there.
Come Wednesday, I call Kimberlin and ask if our grant deed was recorded with the county. She said that it was recorded and that she would send it to me via U.S. Mail. I requested for her to email the documents to me since I needed them ASAP. She said she would email them to me that afternoon.
It was nearing close of business and I still didn't have the grant deed in my e-mail inbox. I call around 4:30pm, and by this time I'm ready to drive down there myself to pick it up! The receptionist, Lindsay, said that Kimberlin was, "in the back scanning the documents to get it ready to send" and that I would receive them shortly. Well, the end of the day came, and still no e-mail.
I called at 7am in the morning and left her a message stating that if she had not yet emailed the grant deed, to please send it to the email I specified.
I ran errands in the morning, constantly checking my emails, and nothing. I decided to just drive down there and pick-up a hard copy! Luckily for them, I was only 20 minutes away.
I get there and tell Lindsay, the receptionist, that I needed a copy of my grant deed. She walked over to Kimberlin's desk, whom I kid you not, was 5 feet away from where I was standing, sitting in her cubicle lined with glass dividers...so I could easily make eye contact with her--oh and hear her talk, even in a whisper.
I could overhear her telling Lindsay that she had sent the grant deed yesterday and this morning and that she didn't know why I was there to pick it up. Well, Kimberlin, if you had done your job correctly, I wouldn't have had to waste my time and physically go to the office because you couldn't get my email address correctly...or better yet, you probably didn't even send it at all. Why in my right mind would I go to the office if I already had it in hand?
I could hear their conversation loud and clear. Kimberlin handed Lindsay the documents and Lindsay handed them to me. Kimberlin DID NOT get out of her seat nor did she greet me when she realized who I was. Coming from a retail background myself, customer service is key! I expected her to get up out of her seat, personally hand me the documents, and apologize for her lack of urgency with the matter.
If she had really emailed me the documents, she should've called me to confirm that I received them, which she did not do. She should have followed-up like she said she would, and she should've done her job, like she gets paid to do.
Instead, I had to do her job for her. I had to follow-up with her, I had to instill a sense of urgency, because obviously it wasn't important to her, and I had to go out of my way to get this done when SHE should have been going out of her way seeing as it was their mistake. read more
