Credit Cards

This summary has been provided for your convenience.  However, the Clerk-Recorder’s Office cannot give legal advice and, therefore, suggest that you contact your own legal advisor to assist you.

Fees at the Clerk-Recorder-Assessor’s Office are set by statue, law, or ordinance.  Many times, fees are required to be split in certain ways (for instance, $2.00 to the state department of public Health, $2.00 to the Sonoma County Superior Court, etc).  By law, we cannot alter these fees. 

We cannot increase a fee to spread the cost of the credit card fees among everyone, as our office is prohibited from requiring people to subsidize services for other people.  The options we have are to charge those who want to use a card a service fee, or to not offer credit card purchases at all.