Activities of a notary

• A notary is a public official, a state-appointed person who performs notarial activities and other activities pursuant to Act No. 323/1992 Coll. on Notaries and Notarial Activities (Notarial Regulations), as amended.
• The notary’s mission is to provide notarial services impartially and independently so that the rights and legitimate interests of all parties to a legal transaction are equally secured. The notary is bound only by the Constitution of the Slovak Republic, constitutional laws and laws. In the performance of notarial activities, a notary shall have the status of a public official and shall be obliged to maintain confidentiality of all facts of which he becomes aware in the exercise of his free profession.

Notarial activity is:

A. Drawing up and issuing deeds

• contracts and agreements (e.g.: contracts of sale, contracts of gift, contracts of exchange, contracts of provision, settlement of co-ownership interests, etc.)
• agreements on the reduction or extension of the statutory extent of the community of property of the spouses
• agreements on the dissolution of the community of property and on the reciprocal settlement of the matrimonial property
• articles of incorporation/agreements of companies
• wills, instruments of disinheritance
• deeds of other legal acts (e.g. writs of execution)

B. Certification of legally relevant facts At the request of a party, the notary shall certify facts which could be the basis for the exercise of rights or which could produce legal consequences, in particular certificates:

• on the accuracy of a copy or photocopy of a document (vidimation)
• the authenticity of the signature on the instrument (legalisation)
• that the instrument has been produced and when it was produced
• the protestation of bills of exchange
• on the conduct of general meetings and meetings of legal persons
• the fact that someone is alive
• the declaration of retention of title to immovable property
• other facts (e.g. the conduct of a lottery, certification of the conformity of personal data for the purposes of the commercial register)

C. Proceedings in matters of notarial depositions

The notary shall, at the request of the depositor, accept for notarial safekeeping:

• deeds (in particular wills and deeds the contents of which can be assessed)
• money and securities, if they have been handed over to him with a request to release them to a specific recipient (e.g. in the case of a transfer of immovable property, release of the purchase price only after the registration of the title has been authorised in the land register)

D. Acts relating to notarial central registers

Notarial Central Register of Pledges  (NCRzp)

On the basis of an application, the notary registers pledges to movables, receivables, to a company or its parts, changes in the registered data, the commencement of the pledge and also the deletion of the pledge.

The NCRzp is a public register, everyone has the right to consult the register of liens and to request extracts from it. Upon request, the notary will issue extracts from this register or a confirmation that a certain registration does not exist in the register of liens.

Notarial central register of designated legal persons (NCRpo) 

The notary shall, upon certification of the declaration of the designated legal person that the conditions for entry in this register have been met, carry out the registration and issue a certificate to that effect. The registration period shall be from 1 September to 15 December.

Notarial central register of wills (NCRza)

All wills, instruments of disinheritance, revocations of these acts or other acts in the event of death, which have been drawn up in the form of a notarial deed or which have been accepted for safekeeping by a notary, are registered in the NCRza.

Notarial central register of auctions (NCRdr)

At the request of the authorised person, the notary shall ensure the registration of the statutory data on the voluntary auction in the Notarial Central Register of Auctions and shall issue a confirmation thereof to the applicant. The Notarial Central Register of Auctions shall contain a list of announced auctions. This list shall contain in particular the subject of the auction, the names/details of the auctioneer, the auctioneer, the place and time of the auction.

Notarial central register of certified signaturesv (NCRop)

Every single signature that has been certified at the Notary’s Office shall appear under a number in this central register, together with the applicant’s details. The notary shall keep a book of certified signatures in a material form, which shall contain the serial number, the date of the act, the serial number of legalisation assigned by the Notarial Central Register of Certified Signatures, the signature of the person whose signature has been legalised. The addressee of the act, who has the document on which the legalization was performed, can check via the Internet (on the website of the Chamber www.notar.sk) after entering the data /after entering the serial number for legalization; the name and surname of the person to whom the legalization was performed; his/her birth number or date of birth/, whether this notarial act was performed in the Slovak Republic on that day and which notary performed it.

Notarial central register of notarial minutes (NCRnz)

It contains notarial deeds executed by a notary public and other documents deposited in the Register of Deeds at the request of a natural person or legal entity. The notary shall ensure that the notarial deed is deposited in electronic form in the register of deeds on the day it is drawn up and shall ensure that the original of any document is deposited in electronic form in the register of deeds on request.

The addressee of the act, who has the notarial deed at his disposal, can check on the Internet (on the website of the Chamber www.notar.sk) after entering the data of the file mark N, the file mark NZ and the date of the notarial deed, whether such notarial deed was drawn up on that date in the Slovak Republic and which notary drew it up. It is not possible to access the content of the notarial deed.

Notarial special register (Nor)

A notary may issue extracts from data entered in special registers and certify their accuracy, for example, to issue extracts from the commercial register usable for legal transactions or to issue copies of documents stored in the collection of documents of the commercial register. The notary issues certificates and extracts from the data entered in the notarial central registers, which are public documents.

E. In connection with the performance of notarial activities, a notary may:

(a) provide legal advice,

b) draw up other documents (e.g. powers of attorney, various documents necessary for the registration of companies in the commercial register)

(c) to carry out the administration of their property and to represent them in connection with the administration of their property

d) to provide representation in cadastral proceedings (including filing the application for registration in electronic form for half the administrative fee)

F. Other activities entrusted to the competence of the notary by a special law, in particular in inheritance proceedings

The notary, as a court-appointed commissioner, conducts the succession proceedings, during which he/she performs all the acts aimed at the conclusion of the succession and the arrangement of the property belonging to the succession in favour of the heirs. The notary acts as a court commissioner on behalf of the court in return for remuneration and issues the certificate of succession in his own name or prepares all the necessary documents for the court’s order.