Estate planning firms grappling with the logistical demands of trust signings now have a new option from Prestige, which has announced a signing support service that bundles document printing, binder assembly, and delivery by a notary directly to the signer. The service, developed in response to the administrative workload of an existing estate planning client, is now being offered broadly through Prestige Notaries.
The announcement matters because it shifts time-consuming preparation tasks—ordering binders and tabs, printing documents, organizing and sealing materials, and arranging delivery—from the firm’s staff to the signing assignment itself. The service originated with a client that was assembling tabbed trust binders internally and paying to ship them. Under the new arrangement, Prestige assumes responsibility for those steps, and the firm no longer needs to assemble binders or absorb shipping costs. For an industry where accuracy and presentation are critical, outsourcing these tasks could reduce overhead and free staff to focus on client relationships and legal work.
The development reflects an approach described by Jennifer Garland, founder, President and CEO of Prestige Companies: listening to a client’s specific operational needs and building support around those needs. In this case, a process created for one firm became a service offered more broadly. Garland founded Prestige in 2015 after working as a paralegal at the Washington State Attorney General’s office and managing a mortgage company. Her mortgage industry experience exposed a need for streamlined processes and hand-vetted notaries, and Prestige Notaries was established to address that need. Today it serves banks, corporations, and law firms, with a database of more than 260,000 notaries across all 50 states.
Independent professionals are central to the company’s service model. Garland describes the notaries and field agents working with Prestige as small business owners whose independence remains important to the relationship. Her approach emphasizes helping those professionals become self-sufficient contractors rather than dependent on the company. Support includes clear expectations, access to resources, and ongoing communication with the service team. Prestige Notaries maintains a foundational set of standard operating procedures across industries and clients, and training addresses those standards and their application. The company pairs that structure with a consistent vetting process for every notary it places, regardless of location or assignment.
Notarial law varies by state, and Prestige has built a library of state-by-state guides for its team. The guides provide a reference for jurisdiction-specific requirements without requiring team members to rely on memory. Together with training and vetting, the library forms part of the operational support behind assignments involving professionals in different states. The company’s assignment history includes complex logistics, such as arranging for a notary and field agent to travel by float plane to a remote Alaskan island for an executive retreat, or coordinating a commercial signing with 17 signers across five cities and three time zones simultaneously. These examples illustrate the range of logistical requirements handled alongside document preparation and professional placement.
For estate planning firms, the new service could mean fewer internal steps and more predictable signings. By integrating binder preparation and delivery into the notary assignment, Prestige aims to reduce the administrative friction that can delay closings and distract staff. The service also extends the company’s existing signing coordination, which already includes shipment tracking within its platform, allowing clients to monitor progress without contacting carriers. As firms seek efficient ways to manage trust signings, Prestige’s offering represents a notable development in the notary and document preparation space, with potential implications for how estate planning practices structure their back-office operations.
