Land titles glitch cause of irritation
City family out $370 as a result of snarl in portal
It’s a nearly $400 hit, a month before Christmas, for a Calgary family whose move to a new home was snarled by a disruption to the province’s online land titles portal.
Former Calgary broadcaster Bridget Brown and her family were set to close a real estate deal on their new house in Highwood Park on Thursday but, like many others in the province, had to contend with a technical glitch that left the province’s online portal for land titles down for days.
“I’m out $370 through no fault of my own,” said Brown, whose real estate lawyer recommended she purchase land title insurance to prevent them from having to essentially pay rent on their new property until the agreement can be finalized.
“For my family, it didn’t end up being a big deal, but there are others, especially right before Christmas, where it’s going to hurt.
“I’m hoping Service Alberta will reimburse people who’ve been inconvenienced.”
The troubles began Sunday evening, when a routine systems upgrade on the site — which is the main database for crucial land titles documents needed to finalized real estate sales — resulted in a provincewide system outage.
On Tuesday, the ongoing outage prompted Service Alberta to close its land titles offices in Calgary and Edmonton.
Late Wednesday, Service Alberta announced the glitch had been fixed and that systems were back online.
“We thank everyone for their patience and understanding while we worked to restore services. Offices will be open (Thursday) at 8:15 a.m.” read a posting on Service Alberta’s Twitter page Wednesday evening.
In a post on Service Alberta’s website, the ministry said the delays in bringing the web portal back online were the result of due diligence.
“Service Alberta has conducted the due diligence necessary to protect privacy and personal information and to ensure the integrity of land titles registry data,” the statement read.
“We are investigating the root cause of the technical issue and are taking steps to prevent a reoccurrence.”
A spokesperson from the ministry on Wednesday could give no indication if those who’ve had to pay extra to protect their real estate transactions will be reimbursed.
For Brown — who spoke to Postmedia before services were restored Wednesday — the most frustrating part has been the lack of information coming from the province.
“My frustration comes from the fact I can’t get any answers from Service Alberta,” she said.
The province had previously said that once systems were back in working order, it would extend hours at land titles offices to help deal with any backlog.
Service Alberta has conducted the due diligence necessary to protect privacy and personal information and to ensure the integrity of land titles registry data.