Effective September 30, 2026

Terms of use

These terms are an agreement between you and Erik Mitbrodt, operating as ProbateBuddy ("ProbateBuddy", "we", "us"). By using the website, or by completing the questionnaire and confirming the acknowledgement at the end of it, you accept them. If you do not accept them, do not use the service.

1. What ProbateBuddy is

ProbateBuddy is a document preparation service. It takes the answers you give in a questionnaire and fills in the British Columbia Supreme Court forms for an application for a grant of probate under Part 25 of the Supreme Court Civil Rules, then gives you the completed forms as one document in filing order. Depending on your answers, the package contains some or all of: Form P1 (Notice of Proposed Application), Form P2 (Submission for Estate Grant), Form P3 or P4 (Affidavit of Applicant), Form P8 (Affidavit in Support), Form P9 (Affidavit of Delivery), Form P10 (Affidavit of Assets and Liabilities), Form P17 (Notice of Renunciation) and Form 109 (Supplementary Affidavit).

The forms are filled from your answers by fixed rules. No wording is generated by artificial intelligence, and nothing is added that you did not provide, other than the prescribed text of the forms themselves.

2. What ProbateBuddy is not

• Not a law firm, and not legal advice. ProbateBuddy does not advise you about your estate, your will, your entitlements or your options. Erik Mitbrodt is a lawyer, but ProbateBuddy is not his law practice, and using ProbateBuddy does not make him, or anyone, your lawyer. No solicitor-client relationship is created. See the Legal notice.
• Not a review of your answers. We do not check whether your answers are true, complete or consistent with the will, and we do not read the will.
• Not a filing service. You file the application yourself, at the registry, with the fees, the original will and the other documents the registry requires.
• Not a guarantee of a grant. Registries apply the Rules and their own practices. We do not promise that an application prepared with ProbateBuddy will be accepted or that a grant will issue.

3. Who may use it

You may use ProbateBuddy only if you:

• are at least 19 years old;
• are named as an executor in the will of a person who died leaving assets in British Columbia;
• are applying for probate in the Supreme Court of British Columbia; and
• have read the scope in section 4 and the estate falls within it.

4. Scope of the service

ProbateBuddy is built for straightforward estates. It is for an estate where:

• the person who died left a will, and the original signed will can be filed with the court;
• the estate's assets are in British Columbia;
• the Public Guardian and Trustee is not involved (for example, no beneficiary is a minor or is mentally incapable); and
• there is no dispute about the will, the estate or your role.

If the estate falls outside this scope, ProbateBuddy is not the right tool, and you should speak to a lawyer. We may decline to prepare a package, before or after payment, if your answers show that the estate is outside scope, and section 7 says what happens to your payment in that case.

5. Your responsibilities

You agree that:

• Your answers are your own. You are responsible for their accuracy and completeness. The forms can only be as correct as the answers they are built from.
• You have the authority. You confirm you are entitled to provide the information you give about the person who died and about other people, and to apply for the grant.
• You will review every page before you sign. Several of the forms are affidavits. You will swear or affirm them before a commissioner for taking affidavits, a notary public or a lawyer. Swearing to something untrue can be a criminal offence. Read each form, correct anything that is wrong (see section 8), and do not sign a form you have not read.
• You will do the rest of the application. That includes obtaining a wills search certificate from Vital Statistics, delivering the notices the Rules require and waiting the required period before filing, paying the court's filing fee and probate fees, and filing at the registry. ProbateBuddy does none of these.
• You will get advice when you need it. If you are unsure about anything, if the registry raises a question or rejects the application, or if anyone disputes the will or your role, consult a lawyer.

6. Fees

The fee for a package, plus GST and PST, is shown to you before you pay and is payable before the forms are generated, through our payment processor, Stripe. The fee covers the preparation of one package for one estate, and any regeneration we do under section 8.

The fee does not include court fees (the filing fee, probate fees under the Probate Fee Act, fees for certified copies), the wills search fee, commissioning fees, or the cost of any legal advice.

Price changes apply only to orders placed after the change is posted.

7. Refunds and cancellation

• If we cannot generate a package from your answers, or we decline the estate as outside scope, we refund the fee in full.
• If you cancel before the package is generated, we refund the fee in full.
• Once the package has been delivered, the fee is not refundable, except where the law requires a refund or we decide to give one.

Nothing in this section takes away rights you have under the Business Practices and Consumer Protection Act (British Columbia), including any right to cancel a distance sales contract.

8. Errors and corrections

• If the package contains an error that comes from your answers, tell us before you file and we will regenerate the package from corrected answers at no extra charge, once.
• If the package contains an error that comes from our templates or our software, tell us and we will correct it at no charge, whether before or after filing.
• If a registry rejects or questions an application, tell us. If the cause is a defect in the package rather than in your answers, we will correct the package at no charge. We do not pay court fees or other costs, and we do not appear at the registry for you.

9. Delivery

The package is delivered by email to the address you gave, normally within one business day of payment. Check the whole package as soon as you receive it. Keep your own copy; we delete ours on the schedule in the Privacy Policy.

10. Your information

The Privacy Policy explains what we collect, why, where it is kept and for how long. It is part of these terms.

11. Intellectual property

The court forms are prescribed by the Supreme Court Civil Rules and are public. The questionnaire, the software, the templates that fill the forms, the website and its text belong to ProbateBuddy. You may use the package we deliver for the estate it was prepared for. You may not copy the service, resell packages, or use ProbateBuddy to prepare documents for other people as a business.

12. Acceptable use

Do not use the service for an estate outside British Columbia, give false information, interfere with the service or attempt to access other people's information. We may refuse or stop service to anyone who does.

13. Availability and changes

ProbateBuddy is in development. We may change, suspend or withdraw the service, or change these terms, at any time. Changes to the terms take effect when posted on the website and apply to orders placed afterwards. The terms in force when you paid govern that order.

14. Limitation of liability

To the extent the law allows:

• ProbateBuddy's total liability to you for anything arising from the service, however it arises, is limited to the fee you paid for the package concerned.
• ProbateBuddy is not liable for indirect or consequential loss, including delay in obtaining a grant, court fees, professional fees, lost time, or losses to the estate or its beneficiaries.
• ProbateBuddy is not liable for consequences of inaccurate or incomplete answers, of filing without reviewing the forms, or of using the service for an estate outside its scope.

Nothing in these terms excludes or limits liability that cannot be excluded or limited under the law of British Columbia, including liability for fraud.

15. Responsibility for your answers

You will compensate ProbateBuddy for loss it suffers because information you gave was false or because you were not entitled to give it.

16. Governing law and disputes

These terms are governed by the laws of British Columbia and the federal laws of Canada that apply there. Any dispute will be dealt with by the courts of British Columbia. Before starting any proceeding, write to us and give us 30 days to resolve the matter.

17. General

If any part of these terms is unenforceable, the rest still applies. These terms, the Privacy Policy and the Legal notice are the whole agreement between us about the service. We may assign these terms to a successor operator of ProbateBuddy; you may not assign them.

18. Contact

ProbateBuddy, Erik Mitbrodt
Email: info@probatebuddy.ca