quebec wills

Quebec Wills use a different terminology and have different execution laws compared with the rest of Canada. Quebec Wills that are written with a Notary are not required to go through probate. You can prepare Quebec Wills in the same way as the rest of Canada, with a signature in the presence of two witnesses, but the definitions and format is still different to the rest of Canada. Quebec follow Napoleonic, civil law, as opposed the the rest of Canada that is based on the English common law.

What makes writing a Will in Québec unique?

Overview of Writing a Will in Québec

Une version française de cet article apparaît sous la version anglaise

Everybody has a legal right to prepare their Will. But there are a few different approaches to doing this.

Did you know that you could write your Will on the back of a napkin? It would be a perfectly legal document and if it’s all in your own handwriting, it is known as a holographic Will. In most Canadian provinces, this document doesn’t even need to be witnessed to be accepted by the courts. Québec allows you to prepare a holographic Will and accepts it as a legal document.

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Yes, we now support Québec Wills!

We wrote a blog article back in 2014 explaining why we didn’t support Québec Wills. We explained that it was a really tricky challenge. But the good news is that after months of work, we can now proudly say that our service is available across the whole of Canada, no exceptions. All of our services now support all Canadian provinces and territories, including Québec.

Quebec Wills

Background to Québec Law on Wills

To provide some background, Québec law was established around the middle of the 17th century. Louis XIV decreed that the laws of Québec would be based on the laws of Paris, which were a variant of “civil law”. Although the laws changed a little in the years that followed, the Québec Act of 1774 reinstated the Civil law system for the Province of Québec, even though it had since been placed under British rule. When Canada was officially created in 1867, all Provinces adopted the British “Common Law” of English origin, while Québec retained their “Civil Law” derived from the Napoleonic code.

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