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A certified copy is the Deeds Office's own stamped reproduction of a registered title deed. Where an information copy is marked for information purposes, a certified copy carries the registrar's certification — which is what a court, a foreign authority or a bank asks for when a plain copy will not do.
This is the only decision that matters on this page, and most people need the cheaper one.
An information copy (Section 66) is a complete, legible copy of the registered deed marked for information purposes. It contains exactly the same words as the certified version. Municipalities accept it for building plans, insurers accept it as proof of ownership, and it is what you want if you simply no longer have your own copy. It costs less and arrives faster. Order an information copy of a title deed instead.
A certified copy is the same deed, retrieved and then certified by the Deeds Office registrar as a true copy of the record. You need it when the party receiving it will not accept an uncertified document:
If you have been told to obtain a certified copy, check who is asking and what for — in our experience a good share of requests are satisfied by the information copy, and the certified copy takes weeks rather than days.
A certified copy is not a replacement original. If the original title deed has been lost and the property is to be transferred, a replacement deed must be registered under Section 68 of the Deeds Registries Act — an application made by a conveyancing attorney. No copy of any kind, certified or otherwise, substitutes for that. It is also not a new deed: the content is fixed by what is registered.
Certification is a manual process at the Deeds Office, so the turnaround is measured in weeks rather than days — the current figure is shown in the order panel above. If you need the content urgently and the certification only later, order the information copy first: it will reach you within days, and the certified version can follow.
Not sure which property is registered at the address? Run a property search first — that fee is deducted from a document copy ordered afterwards.
All eleven South African Deeds Offices are covered and you do not need to know which one holds the property. The certified copy is emailed to you as a scanned PDF of the stamped document.
The words are identical. The difference is the Deeds Office certification stamp confirming it is a true copy of the registered record. A normal copy is marked "for information purposes" and is accepted by municipalities, insurers and most other parties. A certified copy is needed where the recipient — a court, the Master of the High Court, a foreign authority — requires certification.
No. Replacing a lost original is an application under Section 68 of the Deeds Registries Act, made by a conveyancing attorney, which results in a new deed being registered. A certified copy proves what the registered deed says; it does not stand in for the original in a transfer.
Because certification is done by hand at the Deeds Office. The deed has to be retrieved, printed, certified by a registrar and released, and that queue moves at the registry's pace rather than ours. If you need the content sooner, order the information copy as well — it arrives within days.
