Searches

Why search at the personal property registry?

You should search the Personal Property Registry before buying personal property or accepting personal property as collateral for a loan. The search result will tell you if the personal property is subject to another registration, it also protects the rights of buyers and creditors.

The Alberta Personal Property Registry Electronic System (APPRES) does not record the amount owing/involved for some registrations. Persons requesting searches should contact the secured party or creditor for more information.

All information registered on APPRES will have a status of "current" or "deleted", it is very important to check the status of information being provided on a search result.

All searches are available on-line from any Registry Agent in the province of Alberta. Check the Registry Agent Product Catalogue for fees.

When purchasing a previously owned vehicle, in addition to a Personal Property Registry search, the Registry Agent can provide a Vehicle Information Report.

What can be searched at the personal property registry?

Individual Debtor Name Search

This determines if there are any registrations for a specific individual debtor name.

Business Debtor Name Search

This determines if there are any registrations for a specific business debtor name.

Serial Number Search

This determines if there are any registrations for specific serial number goods.

Registration Number Search

This determines the status of a specific Personal Property Registry registration number.

Distribution Seizure Search

This determines if there are any registrations for individual and/or business names that may participate in distribution proceeds. This type of search will determine if enforcement proceedings are viable.

Business Secured Party Search

This determines all the registrations for a specific organization.

Certificate of Expired or Discharged Registration Number Search

This determines when a registration expired or was discharged.

How to Ensure Precise Search Results

To ensure complete search results, it may be necessary to conduct more than one search, in some situations it may be advisable to conduct both debtor and serial number searches.

Before the search is printed, carefully check the list of inexact results. If any inexact result closely matches what you have searched, ask to have these results detailed in full for that search result.

Individual Debtor Search

Use the full legal name of the debtor, in the following format:

Last name, First Name, Middle Name

Only one individual debtor name may be searched per search request.

Business Debtor Search

Use the full legal business name of the debtor. Only one business debtor name may be searched per search request.

Serial Number Search

Use the entire serial number of the serial number goods, definition of serial number goods is in section 1(s) of the Personal Property Security Regulation. Do not include in the serial number any hyphens, words, punctuation marks, or symbols that are not part of the actual serial number. Only one serial number may be searched per search request.

Registration Number Search

Use the entire Personal Property registration number which consists of 11 to 15 digits i.e.: 00021612379, the first six digits are the year, month, day. Only one registration number may be searched per search request.

Distribution Seizure Search

Use the full legal name of the debtors, either individual and/or business names. Multiple and alias individual and/or business names may be searched per search request.

Business Secured Party Search

Use the party code assigned to your organization.

Certificate of Expired or Discharged Registration Number Search

Use the registration number that has either expired or been discharged.