The real cost of a pardon: the government charges $50.

If you have searched for how to clear a Canadian criminal record, you have probably seen quotes of $600, $1,000, even $1,600 or more. So it is worth saying plainly, up front:

The Parole Board of Canada's filing fee for a record suspension is C$50. It is set by regulation, and it is the same amount whether you apply entirely on your own or pay someone to help.

Where the four-figure quotes come from

The gap between that government fee and a typical firm's quote is not the government's doing. It breaks down into a few honest line items and one less honest one.

• Fingerprinting. The Board requires a certified criminal record check based on fingerprints, taken at an accredited agency. This is a real cost you pay to that agency directly.
• Court and police records. You need the court information for each conviction and local police record checks for every place you have lived in the past five years. Each has its own small fee, paid to the court or police service that issues it.
• Preparation labour. Organising those records, completing the Parole Board forms, and drafting the required statements takes real work. This is the part a service legitimately charges for.
• Margin. Everything above those costs is the firm's markup — and it is where four-figure quotes come from.

What you are legitimately paying anyone for

You are paying for preparation, not access. Nobody — no firm, no consultant, no lawyer — has a faster lane to the Parole Board or any influence over its decision. What a good preparer does is make sure your application is complete and well-organised, because incomplete applications are the single biggest cause of delay and refusal.

Our position

We charge a flat C$399 to prepare your application. On top of that you pay the government's C$50 filing fee directly to the government — it never passes through our checkout — plus your own costs for fingerprints and record checks. Every one of those lines is shown before you commit to anything.

You can also do it entirely free

If you would rather do the whole thing yourself, you can, and it will cost you only the government and record-check fees. The Parole Board publishes the forms and a complete step-by-step guide. We link to it here because pointing you to the free route when it suits you is part of how this works — not a threat to it.