On the _______day of ______ in the year_____, before me, the undersigned notary public, personally appeared. An acknowledgment is one of the most common types of notarial acts, but it often confuses Notaries.Here are 5 steps to performing an acknowledgment. A New York notary acknowledgment is used to confirm the legitimacy of an individual's identity and signature on a document. The signer instead makes a mark (such as an "X") or other symbols on the document. The certificate of acknowledgment (PDF) must be in the form set forth in California Civil Code section 1189. I'm going to take a minute here and we're going to cover how to properly do an all-purpose acknowledgement for the state of California. WITNESS my hand and official seal. Signature. (Seal). A notary public or other officer completing this certificate verifies only the identity of the individual. I am here doing a um mock notarization for an acknowledgement and durat i want to show you how to fill out both of them.