If you are a notary employed by a bank, title company or law firm, this article is not for you. Your employer handles the payroll taxes on your wages. This is for commissioned notaries and signing agents paid as independent contractors.

Most guides for self-employed people can be applied to notaries with small adjustments. This is the one place where that is false, in your favour — and the one place where over-applying it will cost you.

The short answer

Self-employment tax
Fees for services performed as a notary public exempt
Everything else you are paid for in the same engagement normal treatment
Income tax on all of it unchanged — still owed

The exemption is real and unusually valuable. It is also written narrowly, and a notary signing agent's fee usually buys more than notarial acts.

What the instructions actually say

The Schedule SE instructions exempt "fees received for services performed as a notary public", and then give two different mechanics depending on the rest of your income.

If notary fees are your only self-employment income:

"If you had no other income subject to SE tax, check box number 3 and enter 'Exempt—Notary' on Schedule 2 (Form 1040), line 4. Don't file Schedule SE."

If you have other self-employment earnings of $400 or more:

"However, if you had other earnings of $400 or more subject to SE tax, enter 'Exempt—Notary' and the amount of your net profit as a notary public from Schedule C on the dotted line to the left of Schedule SE, line 3. Subtract that amount from the total of lines 1a, 1b, and 2, and enter the result on line 3."

Note what the second route assumes: that you can state the amount of your net profit as a notary public as a distinct figure. If your books hold one undifferentiated number for "signing work", you cannot produce that line without inventing it.

The real work is the split, not the exemptionClaiming the exemption is one line on a form. Being able to support the figure on that line is a year of recordkeeping.

Why a signing fee is usually more than notarial acts

Picture a $125 loan signing. What did the borrower's lender actually pay for?

  • The notarial acts — the acknowledgements and jurats you performed and journaled.
  • Printing — often two sets, sometimes a hundred-plus pages.
  • Travel to the signing.
  • Courier or drop-off, and scan-backs.
  • Time at the table walking the borrower through the package.

Only the first is a service performed as a notary public. The exemption is written against that phrase, so the other components sit outside it and are treated like any other self-employment income.

This is not a technicality invented by cautious accountants. It follows from the words the exemption is written in.

What a defensible split looks like

There is no IRS formula here, which cuts both ways: nobody can tell you a number is wrong on its face, and nobody will accept a number you cannot explain.

Three anchors that make a split explainable:

  1. Your own published fee schedule. If you quote $15 per notarial act and $110 for the rest of a signing package, the split is documented before the engagement, not reconstructed after it.
  2. The notarial acts actually performed, recorded in your journal. You are already required to keep a journal in most states. It is also the only contemporaneous evidence of how many notarial acts a given signing involved.
  3. Published state maximum notary fees, where your state sets them. A per-act maximum gives a ceiling that is not your own invention.

The method matters less than choosing one, agreeing it with a qualified tax professional, and applying it the same way every time. A split that changes to suit the year is the one that cannot be defended.

What the exemption does not do

It does not make the income tax-free. This is the misreading that does the most damage. Exempt from self-employment tax means exempt from the 15.3% Social Security and Medicare piece. Income tax still applies to every dollar.

It does not remove the Schedule C. The business is still a business. Profit is still computed the normal way, expenses and all.

It does not follow the money to other work. A notary who also does loan signing coordination, courier runs or real estate assistant work has ordinary self-employment income from those, and the $400 test above then matters.

It does not stop a 1099 arriving. Signing services report what they paid. For tax year 2026 the 1099-NEC threshold is $2,000, so smaller-volume relationships may send nothing at all — which changes the paperwork, never the liability.

Mileage, because you drive to every appointment

The IRS lists two business standard mileage rates for 2026: 72.5 cents per mile from January 1 through June 30, and 76 cents from July 1 through December 31. The 2025 rate was 70 cents for the whole year.

For a job that is one appointment after another, the mid-year change is not a footnote. Two hundred miles a week either side of July 1 are worth different amounts, and the only thing that lets the right rate be applied is the date on each trip entry.

Keep the miles and the dates. The rate gets applied later, and it is now year-specific and half-year-specific.

A routine that supports all of it

  1. Log each signing with its notarial acts — your journal does half of this already.
  2. Record the fee against your split method at the time, not at year-end.
  3. Keep printing, courier and travel costs as their own expense lines; they are deductible, and they also evidence that the fee covered non-notarial services.
  4. Capture trip date and miles for every appointment.
  5. Carry one notary net profit figure into the return, supported by the method you chose in January.

The exemption rewards notaries who can tell one kind of work from another in their own records. That is the whole job.

Track it now. Thank yourself in April.

Common questions

Do notaries pay self-employment tax?
Not on fees received for services performed as a notary public. The Schedule SE instructions exempt those specific fees. Other self-employment income — including parts of a signing engagement that are not notarial acts — is treated normally.
How do I claim the notary exemption?
The instructions give two routes. With no other income subject to SE tax: "check box number 3 and enter 'Exempt—Notary' on Schedule 2 (Form 1040), line 4. Don't file Schedule SE." With other earnings of $400 or more subject to SE tax, you enter "Exempt—Notary" and your notary net profit on the dotted line to the left of Schedule SE line 3, and subtract it there.
Is my whole signing agent fee exempt?
Generally no. The exemption is written against "services performed as a notary public". A signing fee that also pays for printing, travel, courier or scan-backs covers services that are not notarial acts, and those parts do not sit inside the exemption.
Does the exemption mean notary income is tax-free?
No. It is an exemption from self-employment tax only. The income is still reportable and still subject to income tax.
Do I still file a Schedule C?
Yes. The exemption changes how the profit flows into self-employment tax; it does not remove the business from your return.
How should I split a signing fee?
On something you can explain — your own fee schedule, the notarial acts actually performed, published state maximums where they apply. The split is a facts question, so agree the method with a qualified tax professional and then apply it consistently rather than deciding it afresh each January.
What mileage rate applies to signing appointments in 2026?
The IRS lists two business rates for 2026: 72.5 cents per mile from January 1 through June 30, and 76 cents per mile from July 1 through December 31. Keeping the date on each trip is what lets the right rate be applied.

This article is for educational purposes only and does not constitute tax, legal, or financial advice. Consult a qualified tax professional about your situation.

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