About Our File Request Process

Thank you for your enquiry. We are not able to give out information about our clients or their work with us to anyone other than our clients themselves, or their authorized representative.   

The cost to provide this information or documentation

By submitting the file request, you acknowledge that we charge for our time, and any disbursements involved in determining if we have a file and/or retrieving a file from storage (even if that storage is electronic). Our current rate for a file retrieval request is $300.00 per hour plus taxes and any disbursements incurred in dealing with your request. As a minimum, we charge $300.00 plus taxes.

Assuming that you have the appropriate authority to deal with the matter, you (not the client) will be responsible for paying that bill when you come in to see us.  We may ask you for a retainer to cover these costs.

Our duty of confidentiality

We know it can be frustrating for friends and families that we don’t share information about our clients, but we have a very important professional duty of loyalty, confidentiality, and privacy to our clients, even if they are incapable or have passed away.

What’s the process?

The first step to seeing if we can share information or documents with you is determining if you have the authority to request the information.

Once we determine that you have the authority to request the information, there are a few other steps we need to take to make sure we meet our professional obligations. We will work out what those other steps might be depending on what you are asking for, and what your authority is.

Proving your authority

If you are not requesting information about your own file, you might be asked to prove that you have the authority to act for the client by providing one of the following:

  • a fully signed, valid Power of Attorney
  • a Grant of Probate or a Grant of Letters of Administration
  • a court order, including a Committeeship order

If you are acting for someone in one of these capacities, we will need to see the original authority document in question – the original Power of Attorney, Grant or court order.  You will need to come in to one of our offices to give us that document along with your ID.  We will take a copy of it for our records and return it to you.

If the client (or the court) named more than one person to act together as an attorney, executor or other authorized person, then we will need proof of ID and instructions from both authorized persons.

If the client has died, we will also need to see the original Death Certificate (in English) for the client.

Identifying you

The next step is to prove you are who you say you are. We will need to see two pieces of current, government issued ID from you to identify you.  If you are not near one of our offices, you can ask us about verifying your identification documents by using a third party ID verification service.

Reviewing the authority document

It’s important to understand that just because you have been given a Power of Attorney or other authority, that does not automatically override our duty of care to our clients.

For example, imagine you are acting under a Power of Attorney for a client, but that Power of Attorney document is restricted to the sale of the client’s house.  We would be able to share most information with you about the sale of the house, but not about their estate planning, or their vehicle or other things not related to the sale.

We may not be able to share all things with you simply because you have such a document. We need to review the document and determine next steps.

Depending on the situation, we may need to call our client to discuss your request.

If the client is unavailable, or unable to discuss the matter with us, we may have additional questions or documentation for you. If the client is available and capable, and refuses to allow us to share information with you, then we will not share information with you, even if you give us a document showing you have the authority to act for the client.

If the client’s capacity is in question, more steps will be taken to deal with your request.

Requests from your lawyer

If you are represented by a lawyer with respect to this matter, please have your lawyer contact us directly. Depending on the nature of your request, we may also need to pass your request through our insurer, which could delay any response. Simply getting a request from your lawyer does not automatically mean we will share this information with them or you. It is simply that they may be able to assist with identifying you and providing us with your authority for this request.

We will do our best to respond to your request in a timely matter.

Thank you!

File Retrieval Request

Information About the Person Making the Request

Full Legal Name(Required)
Your Address(Required)
Your Email Address(Required)

Information about the file

Please provide any information you have regarding the file you are requesting information about:
Type of File(Required)
(if there are alternate versions of the client’s name, please advise us as this will assist in our search)
For example, a copy of the documents you signed?