Search Help
Basic Search
Most notices on Ez Notice can be located easily using the Basic Search box located at the top right of every page on the Ez Notice site. Simply type in the term that you expect to find in the notice, separated by spaces and press the enter (or return) key on your keyboard.
Results will be listed on the search results page. Similar to browsing notices, a page navigator will be displayed if the search results in more notices that can what can be displayed on a single page. By default, Ez Notice combines the search terms typed into the Basic Search box to filter the results. The more terms you enter into the box the fewer the number of number of notices will be returned in the search results list. See the Search Tips to learn more about the best methods to find notices of interest and to quickly narrow down your search results to just the information that is pertinent to you.
Advanced Search
Ez Notice's most powerful search features are located on the Advanced Search page of the Search tab. The Advanced Search page allows you to search notices based on the date (or range of dates) the notice was posted, the state, county, city, any text contained within the notices and the category to which the notice was posted. An example of the Advanced Search page is provided below.
The Advanced Search page has several features to make selecting search criteria easy. In the posting date you will see two fields as identified below.
The first field represents the starting date for notices and the second field the ending date. If you leave one or both of these fields empty, the posting date of the notice will not be utilized to filter the search results. If you leave the first date field empty but provide a date in the second date field you are instructing Ez Notices to search for all notices on the site that were posted up to an including the date in the end date field. If you provide a date in the first date field but leave the second date field empty, you are instructing Ez Notice to search for all notices that were posted on or after the date in the first date field. This will include notices that are dated in the future. Populating dates in both the date fields instructs Ez Notice to search for all notices that were posted on or after the first date and up to and including the second date field. Next to each date field is a small graphic of a calendar. Clicking on the small graphic pops up a calendar picker where you can navigate through the calendar to find the date you want. Here is an example of the pop up calendar picker.
Clicking on a date will close the pop up calendar and populate the date field to the left of the calendar graphic with the date you selected. If you find it is faster to type dates into the fields you may do so. It is recommended that you type in dates in a MM/DD/YY or MM/DD/YYYY format. Ez Notice is forgiving on most date formats and will accept other date formats and convert them correctly. For best results, we recommend you use the pop up calendar picker or type dates in using one of the formats listed above.
Ez Notice also supports searching based on the state, county and city associated with the notice. The county and city fields on the search form are disabled by default. An example of the page display is included below.
To select a state, click on the State drop down and you'll be presented with a list of available options.
After selecting a state, the county field is enabled and populated within counties that exist within that state.
You must first select a county for the city field to be enabled and populated with cities located in that county. Just like the date fields, you can leave any and/or all of these fields blank and the search will not use any of this data to locate and filter notices for display.
The keywords field will search the body if the notice for any and all terms entered into this field. Keywords should be separated by spaces.
Notices can also be searched by category. Simply select a category from the list and only notices matching that category (and any other search criteria you've selected) will be displayed.
If you have an Ez Notice account and are logged into your account when using the Advanced Search page, you will also see the 'Save search as' field.
This will allow you to save all of the criteria from the Advanced Search form and save it for later use. These saved searches are listed on your Saved Searches page under the My Account tab. You may name these searches anything you would like and the names do not have to be unique. This name is for your benefit so that you can quickly recall the types of notices that the search should locate. If you'd like to use this feature but don't have an account, sign-up for one now. It only takes a minute to sign-up, activate your account and begin using this powerful feature.
Once you've selected the search criteria press the 'Search' button at the bottom of the page and your search results will be displayed. If you would like to refine your search criteria, simply press your browsers back button, modify the form and press the search button again.
Search Tips
Ez Notice contains a very large collection of public and legal notices. To ensure you find what you looking for, we recommend you follow the following tips.
When you first start searching, use as few terms as possible. This will give you the largest collection of notices and ensure the notice you are looking for is included. The best way to narrow down search results is to specify them by location. Start first with selecting a state and then a county. Note that some postings are considered appropriate for the entire county and therefore the notice poster has not provided a city for that notice. If you select a city, Ez Notice will only return notices that specifically list that city name. If you are not sure if the city will be listed or not, you can try putting the city name in the keyword field. When the city name is in the keyword field the search will return notices that contain that city name whether the name is located in the main text of the notice listing or it was specified by the notice poster.
As indicated above, you can enter dates in several formats and Ez Notice will typically convert these and correctly use the date to filter the search results. For best results, we recommend you use the date picker to ensure the date is valid and it is properly formatted for Ez Notice. This is often the fastest method to pick dates and it is guaranteed to be a valid date and in the proper format.
The keywords portion of the Advanced Search can be very powerful. Try to start your search with as few terms as possible and add terms as necessary to narrow down the results. Note that for best results try both singular and plural forms of terms such as ‘proposal’ and ‘proposals’. Ez Notice will find both forms if you use the signular term as Ez Notice will match both ‘proposal’ and ‘proposals’. Entering the term ‘proposal’ however will return notices that contain the singular term ranked higher in the search results (thus they will be listed first).
In most cases, specifying a date with a saved search is not a good idea as notices are generally posted to on a specific date and not changed or added after that date has elapsed. As a result, it is recommended you leave the date fields blank when saving a search.