What Is a Grant of Probate in British Columbia? The WESA Process

A Vancouver Island marketing director dies in March with a clean will naming her brother executor. He plans to wrap the estate by summer. By July he has just finished mailing the Notice of Proposed Application and is waiting out the 21-day window. By Christmas he is still waiting for the grant — the Victoria registry is running 4 months at the time. The BC probate timeline isn't slow because the procedure is complicated; it's slow because the steps each have their own waiting periods, and they don't run in parallel.

This guide walks through the WESA grant-of-probate process, the Part 25 forms that drive it, the Probate Fee Act math, and what BC executors can realistically expect. For broader context, see our pillar guide on what probate is in Canada.

What WESA changed #

Before March 31, 2014, BC's estates law was fragmented across five separate statutes — the Wills Act, the Estate Administration Act, the Probate Recognition Act, the Wills Variation Act, and parts of the Trustee Act. WESA^[1] consolidated all of these into a single modern framework, with a parallel rewrite of the Supreme Court Civil Rules into Part 25.^[2]

For executors, the practical changes were:

• Single statutory home. All the rules — capacity to make a will, formal validity, intestacy, wills variation, executor powers — live in one place.
• Substantial compliance under section 58. The Supreme Court can now "cure" a will that fails one of the technical formalities if it's satisfied the document represents the deceased's testamentary intentions. This has reduced the harshness of older formal-validity rules.
• Modernized intestacy rules. WESA updated the spouse's preferential share (currently $300,000 where all of the deceased's descendants are also descendants of the surviving spouse, $150,000 where the deceased had children from another relationship) and modernized the rules for common-law and same-sex spouses.
• A single, modern forms package under Part 25 of the Supreme Court Civil Rules.

The application path — the forms in order #

The Part 25 forms package is detailed but follows a logical sequence.^[4]

Form P1 — Notice of Proposed Application. Mailed to every beneficiary, every intestate heir, and the Public Guardian and Trustee (where minors or incapable adults are beneficiaries). Triggers the 21-clear-day waiting period under section 121 of WESA.

Form P2 — Submission for Estate Grant. The substantive grant application itself, filed after the 21 days have run.

Form P3 — Affidavit of Applicant for Grant of Probate (Short). The simpler affidavit form, used for straightforward applications. Form P4 (Long) is used where the application is more complex.

Form P10 — Affidavit of Assets and Liabilities. Inventory of the estate as of the date of death, broken into BC assets and non-BC assets.

Form P9 — Affidavit of Delivery. Confirms the P1 was delivered to everyone entitled to notice.

Form P19 — Estate Grant. The grant itself, prepared by the applicant for the registrar's signature.

Supporting documents — the original will, the death certificate, any codicils, and the Probate Fee Act payment — go to the Supreme Court registry for the judicial district where the deceased lived at death.

The 21-day notice — the BC-specific waiting room #

The 21-day Notice of Proposed Application window is the most BC-specific piece of the process. Other provinces require notice to beneficiaries; BC layers a mandatory waiting period on top.

The window exists to give anyone with grounds to challenge the will time to come forward. The most common challenge route in BC is a wills variation claim under section 60 of WESA — spouses and children can apply to vary a will that does not make "adequate provision" for them, even where the will is otherwise valid. The 21-day notice ensures every potential claimant knows the will is about to be probated.

Three practical implications:

• The clock starts on mailing, not receipt. Calendar carefully; missing the 21-day mark by even one day causes the application to be rejected.
• Every beneficiary, every intestate heir. Not just the people getting something under the will — also the people who would have inherited if the will didn't exist (often siblings, parents, or step-relatives the testator excluded).
• Lost beneficiaries are a real delay source. A beneficiary who can't be found has to be searched for and addressed in the affidavit material. Skip-tracing and substitute service add weeks.

Probate fees and the cost math #

BC's Probate Fee Act^[3] sets the fees:

• $0 on the first $25,000
• $6 per $1,000 on the next $25,000 (so $25,000–$50,000)
• $14 per $1,000 on every dollar above $50,000
• No cap

A $500,000 estate pays $6,450. A $1,000,000 estate pays $13,450. A $2,000,000 estate pays $27,450. Plus a flat $200 court application fee on estates over $25,000.

For estate planners, BC's lack of a cap is the main driver of probate-avoidance work for higher-value estates. Holding the family home through an alter-ego trust, structuring joint ownership, and named-beneficiary designations on registered accounts all have meaningful BC fee implications. See how to avoid probate in Canada for the broader strategy, and our probate fee calculator for the math.

Registry timelines in 2026 #

Total elapsed time from death to grant:

• Pre-application (4 to 8 weeks). Inventory, valuations, beneficiary list, affidavits.
• 21-day Notice of Proposed Application. Fixed.
• Registry processing (3 to 6 months in busier registries). Vancouver and Surrey are the heaviest queues; Victoria and Nanaimo run shorter; smaller registries shorter still.
• CRA clearance (6 to 12 months after filing the final T1 return). Independent of the BC court process.

Total: 6 to 14 months from death to final distribution is typical. Faster only for very small estates or where the estate is mostly joint property and beneficiary-designated accounts.

Where self-represented executors usually run into trouble #

The Part 25 forms are not legally technical, but they are unforgiving on detail. Common stumbles:

• Missing the Public Guardian and Trustee. Where any beneficiary is a minor or an incapable adult, the PGT must be notified. Executors sometimes overlook this and the application bounces back.
• Wills variation exposure. Where the will excludes a spouse or an adult child, the executor needs to understand the section 60 risk before distributing. Distributing early — even after the grant issues — can leave the executor personally exposed if a variation claim succeeds.
• Section 58 curative applications. Where the will has a formal-validity problem (no witness, holograph in a province that doesn't recognize them), an executor needs a curative order before the will can be probated. This requires a separate substantive application — beyond the standard Part 25 package.

What we focus on at It's Simple Will #

It's Simple Will produces will and Life Discovery Kit documents that meet BC's WESA formal-validity requirements and give the executor the inventory and access information needed to assemble a Part 25 application efficiently. See our pillar guides on what probate is in Canada and what does an executor do in Canada, and visit It's Simple Will to start your document set.