2006-07-11 the authority for signature: by order of

A secretary should be always aware when she may to be signed. Just the authority for underwriting “by order of” should be managed in the company for the sake of clarity. Only so it can be excluded that both the secretary and other employees their competences exceed with their signature.

“by order of” – the authority for underwriting is granted in bigger companies regularly and in written and means that it is to underwrite by order of the company, but not directly as an order by the supervisor.

In bigger companies and above all in group-companies the competences and therefore the authorities for signature are managed consequentely. That means for the secretaries mostly that they don’t get the authority for signature “by order of” and so they aren’t allowed to underwrite “by order of”.

In smaller companies it is often a practice, which it is not recorded in written, according to this the secretary underwrites in absence of the chief the standardized letters with the addition “by order of”, to send the letters. New employees should clarify their competences regarding the authority of signature with the supervisor to prevent an inadvertent abuse. Ideally the secretary will grant a signatory power to exculpate the chief.

If this signatory power is completely missing, it only remains the vintaged alternative “for the rightness”. Here is only explained from the person who underwrites, that the text of the letter is correct. The meaning “for the rightness” is nowadays not usual and causes confusion, why it should be avoided.