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It is important for lawyers to ensure a high level of quality control when submitting documents to the Government of Alberta Land Titles office.
In the past year, approximately 190,000 of the nearly 660,000 documents submitted to Land Titles (approximately 29 per cent) have contained a deficiency. This error rate impacts Land Titles staffing resources and the wider legal profession by significantly slowing document processing times.
Specific examples of common errors include:
- unsworn affidavits of execution;
- missing affidavits on caveats;
- missing or incorrect legal description;
- missing name or address for the transferees on a Transfer of Land;
- missing attachments/schedules named in a caveat or mortgage;
- missing witness signatures;
- names of parties shown on documents are not the same;
- names of parties shown on documents are different than on the title; and
- for Dower Compliance submissions, Dower affidavits are not included in packages or are incorrect.
When an incorrect or incomplete document is submitted, a Land Titles analyst must review the document, prepare an itemized list of deficiencies on a Deficiency Notice and, once the document is returned, conduct a secondary complete review of the document. This means that a document containing a deficiency takes approximately three times the amount of work as an error-free document. In practical terms, the 190,000 deficiencies in the past year took the same effort as 570,000 error-free documents.
We strongly encourage lawyers practising in this area to institute quality control measures in their office to provide complete and accurate packages to Land Titles.
Please contact the Government of Alberta Land Titles office for more information or questions.
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