How to Work with Our Investigators

26 March 2026

Do you see ‘BCFSA’ on an incoming call? Pick up the phone and let’s chat.

If you’re ever contacted by a BCFSA investigator seeking information and/or files, do not ignore or avoid our call.

BCFSA responds to complaints

We often receive complaints via our File a Real Estate Complaint webpage. In fiscal year 2024/25, for example, we received 1,403 complaints about real estate. Most of those complaints were about alleged misrepresentation, deceptive conduct, unlicensed activity, or a failure to perform duties to clients. While most complaints lacked evidence and led to no regulatory action, some did spark investigations. Every complaint requires at least some research to see if the evidence requires an official investigation. In 2024/25, investigations resulted in 77 formal enforcement actions like monetary penalties, and 154 led to informal enforcement actions like a letter of advisement.

How our investigators work with your brokerage

Our research begins when an investigator is assigned a file. Often, the investigator then requests the brokerage file from the managing broker. Most investigators call the managing broker with this request and then follow up with an email, giving the managing broker a two-week deadline to provide the file.

The result? Many managing brokers comply immediately and send their file right away. But some managing brokers send us incomplete files, or they wait until the last day to ask any questions, which delays our investigation.

What we need from your managing broker

Our investigators will typically ask for the complete or full brokerage file (or brokerage rental file). A full file means absolutely everything the managing broker has about the transaction/real estate property. Managing brokers are encouraged to read the request carefully to ensure they’re providing what we’ve asked for and when in doubt, call the investigator and ask.

What happens when a licensee is under investigation?

When a licensee is subject to an investigation by BCFSA, we ask managing brokers to encourage their related licensees to:

• Answer BCFSA’s calls
• Promptly provide the information requested
• Attend interviews as requested by BCFSA
• Let BCFSA know early if there may be an issue with meeting the deadline

A managing broker is generally not invited by BCFSA to attend an interview with a related licensee, as the managing broker may be a witness and interviewed separately.

Let’s talk ASAP

When we contact you, we highly recommend you talk with us as soon as possible. Don’t wait until the end of any deadline to ask any follow up questions. If you delay until the very end, it can impact the investigative process and can appear like you’re trying to avoid scrutiny.

Fair warning about deadlines: we consider late submissions to be non-compliance, and this may open you up to administrative penalties and eventual higher investigative costs, even if it’s not a subject of the substantive investigation.

Investigators are on a fact-finding mission, not a fault-finding mission. Sometimes there are reasonable explanations for a turn of events, and no enforcement action is required. The faster we get there, the better for everyone.

Non-compliance penalties add up fast

For an idea of how investigation costs can add up, see Possible Outcomes to a BCFSA Investigation on our website. In the section Enforcement Expenses, you can see the rate BCFSA charges for hours of work by investigators, auditors, and lawyers. These amounts are in addition to any penalties issued for noncompliance with the Real Estate Services Act (RESA) or an investigation. If a licensee is ordered to pay investigative costs, they are charged:

• $100/hour for each BCFSA investigator
• $150/hour for an auditor regularly employed by BCFSA
• $400/hour for non-BCFSA auditors
• $150/hour for a BCFSA lawyer
• $400/hour for non-BCFSA lawyers

The lesson here is simple: if your phone rings and you see BCFSA’s number, pick up and let’s chat. Working together, we can get through the situation instead of avoiding and escalating.

For more information, see our Complaints Process and how cooperating with investigations leads to lower fines.