British Columbia Wills Notice Registry

In British Columbia, the Vital Statistics Agency maintains a wills registry. You, or your lawyer, may file a Wills Notice after you make a new will, revoke your will, or change the location of your will. The notice sets out your name, birth date, place of birth, date of will or codicil, and location of the will or codicil. There is a filing fee, which is currently $17.

You do not need to file a Wills Notice to make a valid will. But, there are a couple of advantages to filing a Wills Notice. First, when you are gone, if your surviving family members do not know if you made a will, or where you kept it, they can search the wills registry. Second, when someone applies to probate a will in British Columbia, he or she must first search the wills registry. If he or she is attempting to probate an old will that you revoked, and you have registered a notice for your more recent will, the wills registry search will show that you made a more recent will.

For more information about the wills registry, see the Vital Statistics Agency's website here.