The complete executor's guide

Before any paperwork: make sure children, dependent adults, and pets are looked after. If the person lived alone with a pet, arrange a neighbour, friend, or temporary boarding today.

A death has to be formally confirmed by a health professional before anything else can happen. You usually don't arrange this yourself — you just need to know who to phone:

• In a hospital or care home: staff do it automatically. Nothing for you to do.
• At home, and the death was expected: the person was likely enrolled in a palliative care or hospice program — a home health service for people who are dying. "Call hospice" means phone that program's 24-hour line (it's on the fridge magnet, care binder, or paperwork they gave you). A nurse comes to the home, confirms the death, and walks you through the next hour. If the person wasn't in a program, call their family doctor's office.
• At home, and the death was sudden or unexpected: call 911. Paramedics or police attend, and the BC Coroners Service may be involved. Don't move the person until told it's okay.

Once the death is confirmed, a doctor or the coroner completes a Medical Certificate of Death. The funeral home uses that to register the death — which is what later lets you order death certificates.

Call a funeral home or cremation provider — they take it from here and do most of the heavy lifting, including registering the death with BC Vital Statistics. You don't need the whole plan figured out today; you can start with just a transfer into their care. (See our BC funeral & cremation directory for vetted options.)

Lock up, bring in the mail (or set a hold), deal with perishable food, and care for plants/pets. Crucial and easy to miss: call the home insurer. Most policies change or lapse once a home sits vacant ~30 days, so tell them it's now unoccupied to keep coverage valid.

Look for the most recent signed will — home safe, desk, safety deposit box, or the lawyer/notary who drafted it. BC also has a Wills Registry: for a small fee you can order a wills notice search from Vital Statistics that tells you if a will's location was registered (you'll need this search to apply for probate anyway). If there's no will, see applying without a will in BC.

You'll need official proof of death to close accounts, claim insurance, and apply for probate. There are two different documents, and the difference trips everyone up:

• Proof of Death certificate — issued by the funeral director, usually free, and accepted by many smaller institutions.
• Death Certificate — the official government document from BC Vital Statistics (around $27 each). Banks, the land title office, and the court typically require this one.

How to order: the simplest route is to ask your funeral home to order the official certificates for you when they register the death. Or order yourself from BC Vital Statistics (online, by mail, or at a Service BC centre). Order 6–10 copies — every bank, insurer, and government office wants its own original, and re-ordering later is slower and costs more.

Read the will to confirm you're named as executor (BC calls this the 'estate trustee'). If you're named, you have the authority to act (confirmed formally by probate later). If you'd rather not serve, you can decline before you begin — talk to a lawyer or notary about renouncing.

Tell immediate family and anyone who needs to know. You don't need to contact banks or government yet — that comes with a plan, so you do it once, properly.

Paper or digital — one place for the will, death certificates, recent bank/investment statements, property deeds, vehicle titles, insurance policies, and the last tax return. You'll reach for these constantly; gathering them now saves weeks later.

Look for life insurance (personal, through work, through the mortgage, or bundled with a credit card), plus home and auto. Life insurance with a named beneficiary is paid directly to that person and usually doesn't go through the estate — claim it directly with the insurer.

Not every estate needs it. The practical test: ask each bank, investment firm, and the land title office whether they require a grant of probate to release the asset — their answers decide it. Real estate in the deceased's sole name almost always requires probate. Start with our BC probate step-by-step, and estimate the cost with the BC probate fee calculator.

The deceased's personal accounts freeze at death (the bank will release funds for the funeral and probate fees on request). Once you have the grant of probate, open a dedicated 'Estate of [name]' account and run every dollar in and out through it — this keeps your accounting clean and protects you personally.

List everything the person owned (property, accounts, investments, vehicles, valuables) and owed (mortgage, loans, cards, taxes), with date-of-death values. This inventory is the backbone of the whole process — and in BC it's also what you swear in the Form P10 and what your probate fee is based on.

For real estate and significant assets, get a written value as of the date of death — a certified appraiser or a realtor's written market opinion. This protects you on both the probate fee and later taxes (the date-of-death value sets the cost base).

BC's probate application has a specific sequence — notify everyone entitled (Form P1) and wait 21 days, then file the Form P2, the applicant's affidavit, and the Form P10 inventory, with the fee. Full walkthrough: Probate in BC, step by step. A lawyer or notary can handle this for you.

Now do the notifications in one organized pass: banks and investment firms, employer/pension plans, and government — in BC that means Service Canada (CPP death benefit and survivor's pension, Old Age Security) and Service BC. Cancel subscriptions, memberships, and recurring charges. Advertise for creditors if appropriate so unknown debts surface before you distribute.

From the estate account, pay legitimate debts and keep up necessary expenses (mortgage, utilities, insurance on estate property). Don't rush to pay or distribute before you're confident all debts and taxes are accounted for.

The deceased's final ("terminal") return is required, and the estate itself may need a return for income earned during administration. Death triggers a deemed sale of assets, so capital gains can be the big number. This is specialized — use an estate-experienced accountant; see also what actually gets taxed at death in BC.

If a home is being sold, a probate sale has its own timing and rules — see selling a house during probate and use a probate-experienced realtor.

Every receipt, every transfer, in and out of the estate account. You'll present this as a final accounting to the beneficiaries, and good records are your protection if anyone questions a decision.

Before you pay out the beneficiaries, obtain a CRA Clearance Certificate confirming all taxes are paid. Distribute before this and you can be left personally on the hook for an unpaid tax bill. Also respect BC's 180-day wills-variation window before distributing.

Give beneficiaries a clear summary of what came in, what went out, and what each will receive. Transparency here prevents disputes.

Pay out according to the will (or BC's intestacy rules), and get a signed release from each beneficiary confirming they received their share. Keep your records for several years in case questions arise.