Filing a Transition Application under the New Societies Act

This information applies to British Columbia, Canada. Last reviewed for legal accuracy by Mary Childs, Michael Blatchford and Steve Carey in November 2016.

All existing societies in British Columbia are required to “transition” within a two-year period from when the new Societies Act came into effect on November 28, 2016. Transitioning involves filing an application in a new electronic system called Societies Online.

This section on filing the transition application covers:

First, are you sure you’re ready to file?

To file the transition application for a society, you must first complete the 5 steps in preparing for transition. Here is a checklist of what you must have done in advance:

✅ You decided whether the society wishes to designate itself as a member-funded society. (And if the answer is yes, your members have approved this by special resolution.)
✅ You brought the society up-to-date in its Corporate Registry filings: its latest annual report is filed and you checked that the registered office and director information is up-to-date.
✅ You have in hand the society’s constitution, rearranged as required, in an electronic format that can be copied and pasted, such as a word processing document.
✅ You have in hand the society’s bylaws, consolidated as required or duly adopted by the members, in an electronic format that can be uploaded, such as a word processing document or a PDF.

Step 1: Get your society’s Registry Key

In November 2016, each society should have received by regular mail an onboarding letter from the Corporate Registry. This letter included a Registry Key that is unique for your society.

You need to input this one-time Registry Key to access your society’s information in the Societies Online system. Once you input the one-time Key, you will be prompted to change your society’s Registry Key. (You will need to provide the updated Registry Key to anyone else who is responsible for completing filings on behalf of the society.)

Step 2: Get yourself a Basic BCeID

The BC government has an online service called BCeID that allows you to use one user ID and password to sign in securely to various government services. To file a transition application, you need your own BCeID account. A BCeID is different from the Registry Key. The Registry Key belongs to the society. A BCeID belongs to an individual.

There are three different kinds of BCeID accounts: Basic, Personal, and Business. To file a transition application, you need a Basic BCeID account, which does not require verification of your identity in person (unlike the Personal BCeID account).

You can obtain the Basic BCeID for free in a few minutes online:

• Go to the Basic BCeID Registration Page.
• Provide the requested contact information and choose a User ID and password.

An email will be sent to the email address you provided confirming that you have registered a Basic BCeID account.

Step 3. File the transition application

These slides walk you through the process to file the transition application on Societies Online. Filing a Transition Application on Societies Online from Drew Jackson

Transitioning an Existing Society: A How-to Guide for Non-profits in BC © Drew Jackson is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Canada Licence.