Is "work Appropriate Ink" Really A Thing?

[Intensity]

So would you think that IG Turquoise is too much to use in more professional settings? I'm asking because while I do like more standard blue-black, I am regularly curious if I could use inks more like KWZ IG Turquoise for signatures and such.

 

For checks, I use waterproof blue or blue-black inks (such as Sailor Sei/Sou Boku), because one never knows if they will be handled by damp hands at some point--don't want any smearing. KWZ IG inks are water resistant but do smear with water contact.

 

On the topic of water-resistance, I think for personal notes it's easier to control writing coming in contact with humidity or moisture. But when writing on paper that might be handled by others, it's never known if someone will have sweaty hands, damp hands from handling a chilled cup, if they've just washed their hands recently, if there's a bit of rain, you name it. I wouldn't use inks that smear enough to obscure the writing. Pale smearing could be okay, for example for inks like J. Herbin Lie de The: it does have a kind of pale orange-yellow component that smears, but a crisp and dark line remains that's highly legible. Some saturated inks smear just from sweaty or damp hands, no water required. In my personal opinion, water resistance and smear resistance should always be considered for professional-use inks.

Edited September 25, 2019 by Intensity

[silverlifter]

So would you think that IG Turquoise is too much to use in more professional settings?

 

For me, bearing in mind I am old school, no. I would consider it a little too "flamboyant" for anything other than marking up documents at work. YMMV.

[BaronWulfraed]

I got surprised by this. The only difference between official and not was a watermark. A friend commented "thatllooks like a photocopy"

Yeah... I went and printed mine on my closest match to the old FCC paper -- doesn't have the "rice grain" hash marks, but otherwise doesn't look like plain photocopier

[wallylynn]

I have some heavy weight with-cotton cream paper from staples. I can fib and say the red and blue fibers are anti-counterfeit, Ala dollar bills. But I'd also like a fancier print than laser, or higher quality laser. So it doesn't rub off so easily. Something with real ink would be great.

[Noihvo]

Which ink is this note ?

 

 

[rosa_m]

I was asking which ink you used to write the note .

 

Very nice Etsy shop !

 

 

[Joe in Seattle]

I worked for decades in the grey|blue suit white shirt & tie years. My only ink was Parker Penman Emerald. I was never questioned about it.

 

Ironically, I still have half bottle left, but the manufacturers have produced so many mor interesting greens, clues, browns, etc.

[Inkysloth]

<snip>

some legal stationers now stock refurbished Parker 51s for this reason.

</snip>

 

I now feel the need to visit a legal stationers... any in London you'd recommend?

[Oldane]

It depends on where one works and the context. For personal notes, anything goes. For more official documents I'd much prefer a conservative color - subdued blue or blue black. People should take note of what is written more than the color of the ink. I'd avoid pure black as this could be mistaken for a copy. I also need some degree of permanency - fade resistance and water resistance. For me as a physician, writing drafts for patient files and prescriptions, using ink that can't withstand being left in the sun for a week or washes away if coffee are spilt on it would be out of the question. All the old ink brands (Parker, Pelikan, Montblanc - you name them) used to have a blue black with iron gall back in the day when everyone used fountain pens. These day there are fewer options. We have say R&K Salix and the KWZ I-G inks which has an amount of iron gall but not so much that it hurts a fountain pen. There is also the very cheap Hero 232 (which is my go-to "business" ink for the time being) - despite the low price it's a very good ink. Diamine Registars, ESSRI and Akkerman IG comply with official criteria for use in public registers etc. but they also have a higher iron gall content necessitating very frequent cleaning of the pen - and don't leave the pen to dry out. And then we have all the "bulletproof" Noodler inks, but maybe the colors of many of them are too much "in your face" for conservative business use (?). Other makers like D'Artramentis also makes highly permanent inks.

[Brianm_14]

I have a Federal Curios & Relics Firearms License (i.e., collector's), and if I sign copies in black ink, it looks like I photocopied it. Each copy should be individually signed. So while I photocopy the license to make firearms transfers, I sign each in blue ink using one of the tamper-proof gel pens. I use the same ink in my all-important record of transfers book ("Bound Book") although one can keep records on a computer now.

 

I am a hardcore fountain pen user, but don't like the pain of using the Noodler's bullet-proof inks, as I don't buy or sell anything very often these days.

 

In my work as a university professor, there is no standard color for ink, but I sometimes send a handwritten note upstream to my should-be-made-a-saint chair, or various deans. Then I like a nice blue such as Diamine Oxford (naturally) or possibly Waterman Brown. The latter is my standard ink.

 

In correspondence with students, or on their papers, the same blue or brown is fine for general comments. For grading and criticism (which remember, can be positive or negative), and for X's on class roster sheets (which students initial), it is always red. Sheaffer Skrip or Diamine Oxblood both do the trick.

 

Fifteen years ago, this particular campus opened, and I joined the inaugural faculty. The IT manager early sent a quite detailed email around telling us, among other things, what information we should and should not have as part of our signature on our email. With already 20 years of academic experience behind me, at several good schools, i promptly blew the arrogant sob off and others followed suite. This reception likely precluded any suggestions in a future email about written correspondence from this same quarter, which certainly would have included his rules about ink colors.

[Michael F]

It really comes down to the application for me, and since I am a lawyer, the vast majority of the time I am using the professionally acceptable colors of blue or black. I use them for anything that is client related. That includes my meeting notes, client letters, and anything that I have to sign (which is a lot--I am an estate planner). Certain documents require certain colors of ink--for instance our register of deeds requires black ink for signatures. We won't sign anything in anything but blue or black.

 

Some of my meeting notes are in inks that are not true blues, such as Waterman Mysterious Blue or Sailor Seiboku--both tend to lean green--but those inks are sort of the exception. For the most part I favor traditional looking inks such as Platinum Blue Black, Pilot Blue or Black Black, and Rohrer and Klinger Salix, and whatever black ink I'm favoring at the moment. These inks also seem to handle all sorts of quality of paper so there's a separate benefit to using them.

 

For things that aren't client related (calendaring, personal notes, etc.) I'll get a little creative--greens, browns, darker oranges and yellows (ala Diamine Ancient Copper or Herbin Lie de The). I do use red for editing (we still do our editing on paper), but I actually use a Pentel Energel for that. Our "first draft" paper is really cheap stuff that does not handle fountain pen ink very well.

[bemon]

I'm curious about the comments and questions about work appropriate ink. For me everything is electronic - emails, word documents, presentations, even electronic signatures.

 

I use fountain pens for my own note taking and the occasional thank you card. So the colors I use are only up to me. I'm not restricted other than what's easy on my own eye for my own notes.

 

In this digital age, are there really people using pen and paper for work that others are seeing? And are there any business standards still out there for ink color?

 

Would love to hear about those cases where its still a thing rather than computers when it comes to work.

Depends. I work in marketing so not really. I know some industries still mandate black or sometimes blue ink, but generally speaking I don't think it matters much these days.

 

For me, 9/10 written communications are done electronically either via email or text. The only inks I use are Iro Shin Kai, Shikiori Yonaga and KWZ Azure #4, so I'm not really using that many different colours anyway but there are no rules for me.

 

For what it's worth though, the odd time I do leave a sticky note for someone or make a note on a shared document I use one of the two dark blue inks. Not because I have to, but because I just think it's more dignified to use a dark ink in general and especially in the office.

 

So long story short: No rules, but in the spirit of decorum I like a dark blue.

[austollie]

I work in a conservative profession and while there are no rules against it, I avoid writing with bright colours. I don't think that looks professional in meetings. For years, all I wrote with in meetings was black ink. Then I started using a fountain pen with red ink to replace the red ball point pen that I'd been using for marking up documents (I do that a lot), but I continued to only write with black ink in meetings. As I added other colours, I kept them at my desk (red and green for marking up texts; blue and blue/ black for signing documents).

 

The arrival of the wonderful Lamy Petrol ink started me on a path of using more colour in conservative meetings. Lamy Petrol is dark enough to pass for black in meetings. Now I am using various other colours in meetings, but I always use dark and muted tones. One of the inks that I really like to use in meetings is Diamine Beethoven. It's a nice and conservative dark green. For me the ink works well, although it has received a bit of a pasting in the review section of this forum. Going in the other direction, I also use Diamine Pansy (because I missed out on Lamy Dark Lilac). That's a little more playful, but in my opinion, still acceptable for use in meetings in a conservative office.

[inkstainedruth]

A friend of mine is a tech writer and she takes notes at meetings that are color coded and the ink matched to her pens (a series of different color Levenger pens, I presume Truwriters). She uses green, blue, purple, red and black (the last time I talked to her about it she was using Chesterfield inks (I don't know if she's switched over to the Diamine counterparts). The engineers thought it was cute until they realized that she was keeping track of who was supposed to do what on the current project by color coding her notes.

My old bank used to require blue or black to sign checks (since being bought out, that has been less of an issue). But even the old bank didn't blink an eye over Noodler's Kung Te Cheng (my blue substitute) and El Lawrence (the black substitute). I figured that "permanent" trumped "color" and the bank never made a quibble. I also (mostly) used KTC the last time we went car shopping (I was forced to use a ballpoint for the carbonless forms for the loan -- but next time I'll be ready and have an Esterbrook with a manifold nib at the ready! )

I am a little surprised when I used Noodler's Upper Ganges Blue, because I was worried that was running towards the "non-repro blue" range of blue. The only place I ever was required to use black was at the ear/nose/throat doctor's office.

My passport is signed with Noodler's 54th Massachusetts and nobody has blinked an eye about that either.

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[Intensity]

I collect checks written with markers all the time Many are barely legible regardless of pen. At this point, a good percent of people seem very lazy about check writing. My bank accepts everything and doesn't complain. (I get asked if mine were written in calligraphy periodically heh, but all I do is very neat regular cursive).

[inkstainedruth]

I collect checks written with markers all the time Many are barely legible regardless of pen. At this point, a good percent of people seem very lazy about check writing. My bank accepts everything and doesn't complain. (I get asked if mine were written in calligraphy periodically heh, but all I do is very neat regular cursive).

 

My current batch of checks are such crummy paper that I might as well be using a marker -- that's how bad the spread is.... Current ink for check writing is Sailor Souboku. The difference between the writing on the check, in the register, and on the return addresss section envelope is just staggering -- you wouldn't know it was all the same pen and ink....

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[silverlifter]

Banks here have EoL'ed chequebooks. Your options now are either plastic or bits, neither of which are fountain pen friendly

[Intensity]

 

My current batch of checks are such crummy paper that I might as well be using a marker -- that's how bad the spread is.... Current ink for check writing is Sailor Souboku. The difference between the writing on the check, in the register, and on the return addresss section envelope is just staggering -- you wouldn't know it was all the same pen and ink....

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

 

I mean I literally get checks written in medium round point sharpie or similar thicker tipping marker--and not even always black color sharpie from some people... It's pretty sad how little effort some people put into check writing to make it legible. I'd be okay with legible ballpoint writing. Last time I got one of those with a kind of turquoise marker writing and wondered if my bank would accept such a check. Luckily it did, without a comment.

Edited October 12, 2019 by Intensity

[bemon]

Banks here have EoL'ed chequebooks. Your options now are either plastic or bits, neither of which are fountain pen friendly

I was paying rent and daycare with cheques. But when I ran out the bank wanted $80 for a batch. When e transfers are free. I asked the super and daycare if I could switch to e transfers and was told that I was the only person left using cheques anyway in both cases.

[inkstainedruth]

I was paying rent and daycare with cheques. But when I ran out the bank wanted $80 for a batch. When e transfers are free. I asked the super and daycare if I could switch to e transfers and was told that I was the only person left using cheques anyway in both cases.

 

$80? YIKES! For me to order 100 checks directly through my bank, I think it's about $12-$13 US -- probably less if I went through one of the companies that puts ads in the batches of flyers that come in the Sunday paper or in the mail. Annoyingly, I don't get a discount for ordering two hundred. And these aren't anything fancy like the kind that have the carbonless forms, or even fancy designs. Just ones with our names and address and the bank account information....

Frankly, I'm not completely convinced that e transfers are 100% safe. I keep hearing stories on the news about places getting hacked. And after this past week, when there was suddenly an issue about whether the phone bill got paid or not (which involved long phone calls with Verizon going "No, I'm NOT the primary person on the account -- just the person who signs the CHECKS every month. And I have the check register showing me that the August bill's check has cleared, and the previous month was before we changed the plan, and I have the September bill where in theory it was paid in person at the Verizon store, and the stub has been removed. Oh, and after getting the text message saying that the account was overdue this morning, the NEW bill came in this afternoon's mail. So here's the account number, AND the invoice number AND the email saying that my husband paid the two month's worth of bills sent to me -- with MY EMAIL on it, as well as the last four digits of the credit card.... And you're telling me that you can't access the account because I'm not the "primary" on it? WTH?" (Oh, my response to the original text on my cellphone was to send back a text saying "We can't pay a bill that we haven't RECEIVED, now can we?" I spent hours checking online banking to see what checks had cleared (because we'd had several temporary checks bought from the bank for an exorbitant amount of money, and didn't remember what all they'd been used for).

The first time my husband was helping with balancing the checkbook with the new bank, he didn't realize that e transfers were not sorted with checks for which there was a scan of the physical check....

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth