In an office usually not: there what counts is an odpis, wypis or duplikat issued by the institution that keeps the document. In many everyday situations a scan is perfectly sufficient, and above all it shortens the path to restoring the original, because it holds every detail the application needs.
Where a scan is enough
A scan or a photo does the job wherever the point is information rather than evidence: providing details for an agreement, reporting a claim to an insurer, completing an internal company form, verifying a policy number, talking to an office by phone.
Where a scan is not enough
Administrative proceedings, court proceedings and notarial acts require a document issued by the competent institution. The name depends on the type of document:
- a notarial deed is restored as a wypis from the office that drew it up,
- a birth, marriage or death certificate as an odpis from any civil registry office,
- a school certificate or a diploma as a duplikat from the issuer,
- an employment certificate most often as a copy of employee records from the employer.
Why a scan still matters
Each of those applications starts with details you simply do not remember once the document is gone: the repertory number, the date it was drawn up, the name of the notary office, the year you finished school, the exact name of an employer from twenty years ago. A scan turns weeks of establishing facts into a single afternoon.
Example
Tomasz is selling a flat and the notary asks for the deed of purchase from fifteen years ago. He has no paper. What he does have is a scan showing the notary’s surname and the repertory number. He calls the office, orders a wypis and collects it within days. Without the scan he would have started by working out which notary in town handled the matter back then.
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