AUGUST 27, 2009

Secretary Land says upgrades streamline system, assist first-time users

Secretary of State Terri Lynn Land today said that Uniform Commercial Code clients will quickly see the benefits of the months of hard work that went into enhancing the Department of State's UCC Online system.

The Web-based program at www.michigan.gov/sos allows users to file, search, correct, amend or terminate UCC financing statements and conduct debtor name searches.

"The improvements to our UCC Online system are a direct result of customer feedback," Land said. "Because of their input, we produced an application upgrade that offers many new benefits, including a heightened reliability, easier operation and improved efficiency."

UCC law governs commercial transactions such as sales, bank deposits, investments and securities. The Department of State is the repository for UCC filings. These filings provide a public record of the collateral a borrower has pledged to obtain a loan and whether other creditors have a financial interest in the same collateral. Customers accessing UCC services include banks, loan agencies, corporations and businesses, farmers and lawyers.

The system has been streamlined to make its use more intuitive, especially for those not familiar with UCC. Some of the improvements include:

• Simpler screen "wizards." Wizards provide users with step-by-step instructions to ensure transactions are completed accurately and efficiently.
• Help links on every page.
• Easier procedures for retrieving a forgotten password.
• Incomplete job storage for seven days.
• An automatic job save and logout, initiated after 30 minutes of user inactivity. A pop-up window will appear as a warning five minutes before automatic logout.

The old and new UCC systems will run concurrently for about 30 days to allow customers to retrieve previous jobs before the old application is shut down.

UCC Online creates documents electronically, which benefits both customers and department staff by eliminating the need for paper documents. Furthermore, the program reduces the processing time for searches from days to minutes and makes newly filed financing statements available immediately.

Customers can also submit filings in person or by mail to the department's UCC Filing Office, Secondary Complex, 7064 Crowner Drive, Lansing, 48918.

In 2008, the UCC office processed about 189,000 filings, 28,000 tax liens and 87,000 search requests.

For more information about UCC and the online application, visit www.Michigan/gov/sos.