Amendment of the HUD 1 form and RESPA requirements is one remedy. The signing agents have a similar problem with low balling client's, non-payment and slow payment also. One of the signing agent boards has announced that American Notary Alliance has been formed to lobby for legislation to assure the signing agents of payment of their fees. Perhaps this is something that the abstractors should consider also. One proposal is to hold the borrower ultimately liable for payment when the TC or lender defaults and tries to argue that the signing agent is a third party vendor not covered by RESPA requirements.

Possibly the lobbying efforts should take the form of a statutory lien similar to the one accorded to attorneys in Connecticut. There are apparently a few states that do afford protection to abstractors via statute, but  a universal federal standard would be better.

Fortunately Connecticut attorneys have a common law lien that attaches to the file following his/her work completed in the amount equal to his/her invoice. The lien travels with the file, and each party that takes possession of the file takes it subject to the lien. The lien extends to the proceeds each receives from the file in the amount of the attorney's lien. I have enforced the lien successfully on a number of occasions for closing services and/or abstracting. Ultimately when a suit is filed against the signing service, TC and lender the proceeds of the borrowers monthly mortgage payments can be garnished either as a prejudgment remedy at the outset of the case or through a court ordered execution at the conclusion of the case. The process almost certainly results in the loss of a slow pay/no pay client...but who needs that type of client?