A recent amendment to the California Rules of Court now expressly permits court filings which contain an electronic signature: “When a document to be filed electronically provides for a signature under penalty of perjury of any person, the document is deemed to have been signed by that person if filed electronically provided that . . . the declarant has signed the document using a computer or other technology in accordance with procedures, standards, and guidelines established by the Judicial Council[.]” (CRC 2.257).
Thus, practitioners should now consider having clients sign court pleadings electronically (through a service such as DocuSign), as doing so can expedite the process for obtaining a client’s signature (which can often be as simple as having your client click on a button on their smartphone), and this process can be especially useful in situations when a client’s signature is needed on short notice.
