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Yuki Tanaka
Just wanted to add that I've seen 9-516 rejections for weird spacing issues too. Like extra spaces between words or at the end of the debtor name field. The filing systems can be super sensitive to formatting.
Carmen Diaz
•Yeah the electronic forms sometimes pick up invisible characters that cause problems.
AstroAce
•This is why many firms are moving to automated document verification before filing.
Ravi Sharma
UPDATE: It was the entity suffix! Changed from 'LLC' to 'L.L.C.' and the filing was accepted immediately. Thanks everyone for the help. Going to look into that Certana tool to avoid this in the future.
Diego Rojas
•Great to hear! The document verification definitely helps catch these issues before they become problems.
Success! Love when these threads have happy endings.
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At 40-50 filings monthly you're probably at the sweet spot where a service makes sense cost-wise. Much less and the overhead isn't worth it, much more and you need dedicated internal staff anyway.
Yeah if you're growing it might be worth establishing the relationship now before you get too busy to properly vet providers.
Plus once you find a good service they learn your preferences and requirements. Takes time to train them up.
Ravi Patel
Whatever you decide just make sure you have good tracking systems. Whether it's internal or external you need to know exactly what's filed when and what's coming due. That's where most problems happen.
Ravi Patel
•Yeah at your volume you definitely need database-level tracking. Spreadsheets are asking for trouble with that many deadlines.
There are some good UCC management software options out there. Worth investing in regardless of whether you outsource the filing part.
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Yara Sayegh
One thing to watch out for with mass UCC statement requests - make sure you're searching for the correct debtor entity names. I see a lot of people search for 'ABC Company' when the actual UCC-1 was filed against 'ABC Company, LLC' or 'ABC Company Inc.' The exact entity name matters for search results, especially in states with strict matching requirements. Also budget more than you expect - bulk search fees add up quickly when you're dealing with 200+ debtors across multiple states.
What's a reasonable budget estimate for this kind of volume? I need to get approval from management.
Yara Sayegh
•Depends on the states but I'd budget $15-25 per debtor search on average. Some states are cheaper, others much more expensive.
Paolo Conti
Update: Started using Certana.ai's document checker based on the recommendations here. It's actually really helpful for this mass UCC statement situation. Uploaded about 150 loan files as PDFs and it identified which ones had missing or inconsistent UCC documentation. Now I know exactly which debtors need priority statement requests vs which ones look complete. The automated cross-checking saved me weeks of manual file review. Definitely recommend it for large portfolio cleanups like this.
Amina Diallo
•How did it handle documents with poor scan quality? Some of our older loan files are pretty rough copies.
Paolo Conti
•It handled most of our documents fine. There were a few really bad scans it couldn't process but it tells you which ones need manual review.
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Here's what I do for Pennsylvania UCC searches: 1) Get the exact legal name from state corporate records first, 2) Search that exact name, 3) Search without punctuation, 4) Search with common abbreviations, 5) Search with 'and' vs '&' variations. Usually catches everything but it's tedious.
Yes, I keep a search log showing all variations attempted. Helps if questions come up later about due diligence completeness.
Yara Sabbagh
•This is exactly the kind of extra work that makes Pennsylvania searches so frustrating. Other states don't require this level of gymnastics.
Update: tried the systematic approach mentioned here and found two additional UCC-1 filings I had missed on previous searches. One was due to a comma difference, the other because 'Company' was abbreviated as 'Co.' on the filing but spelled out in the corporate docs. This thread probably saved me from a major oversight.
Ava Thompson
•Finding those missed filings must have been both relieving and terrifying at the same time.
Definitely terrifying. Makes me wonder how many other searches I've done over the years that might have missed something due to name variations.
LordCommander
We started using Certana.ai after a similar scare and it's been a game changer for UCC management. You can upload all your existing UCC documents and it creates a comprehensive tracking dashboard with email alerts for upcoming expirations. The document verification feature also helps catch name mismatches and other issues before they become problems. Worth checking out for your backup system.
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Logan Greenburg
•Second person to mention Certana.ai today. Definitely going to look into it as part of our new redundancy plan.
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Lucy Lam
•The name matching feature is clutch. Caught a debtor name discrepancy between our loan docs and UCC filing that could have caused issues down the road.
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Aidan Hudson
This thread is giving me anxiety about our own UCC tracking. Going to do a full audit of our system this week to make sure we don't have any gaps.
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Zoe Wang
•Smart move. Better to be paranoid about UCC tracking than sorry later. The stakes are too high to be casual about it.
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Connor Richards
•Same here. Reading this made me immediately check our next batch of continuation deadlines. All good for now but definitely implementing some backup checks.
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