Preparing an Appeal Book BC: Print-Ready Guide for Court of Appeal Filings

If you're preparing an Appeal Book BC filing, small production mistakes can lead to unnecessary delays and reprints.

Most appeal book stress doesn’t start at the registry.

It starts when the book is almost ready—then one small detail forces a scramble: renumbering, reprinting, rebinding, and suddenly everyone’s watching the clock.

We print appeal books every week, and the pattern is consistent: the content is usually fine. It’s the print-ready details that trip people up.

Appeal Book BC: What Must Be Locked Before Printing

1) Keep the content lean and in the right order

Appeal books should include only as much evidence as necessary to resolve the issues on appeal.

And the order matters:

• If the appeal is from a trial, include the necessary evidence in the order it was introduced

• If the appeal is from a chambers hearing, include the necessary affidavits in the order they were filed

• If the appeal is directly from a tribunal, include the necessary evidence that was before the tribunal

From a print floor perspective, tighter books are easier to keep accurate—especially once you’re into multiple volumes.

2) Start with clean, legible source documents

Documents shouldn’t be included unless they can be reproduced clearly and legibly.

This is where “it looked fine on screen” can be misleading. Common culprits:

• faint scans

• tiny text in exhibits

• grey-on-grey photocopies

If you have photographs, they need to be reproduced in their original colour.

If a document is borderline readable, production can’t magically make it readable. Better to fix the source file first.

3) Numbering: lock it before you print

Pages need to be numbered sequentially (or Bates numbered), placed at the top centre, and your

The table of Contents has to match that numbering.

This is the #1 place we see avoidable problems—usually because “final” wasn’t actually final.

We often see:

• An occasional missing page was discovered during printing

• documents swapped or replaced after numbering, which breaks the whole sequence

• late insertions that push every page number downstream

Once a book is printed and comb-bound, fixing numbering is rarely a quick tweak. It’s usually a reprint.

4) Table of Contents: clear and specific

Your Table of Contents should be consistent, clear, and built from the final numbering.

It should describe:

Each exhibit

• exhibit number

• full description of the document

• exhibit date

Each affidavit

• name of the deponent

• date the affidavit was filed

• description of any attached exhibits

This isn’t just “clerical.” A strong TOC helps your team (and ours) verify the set quickly before binding.

5) Physical format rules (the part printing can’t be improvised)

Before production starts, confirm the physical requirements are being followed:

• cover and back page (no clear plastic covers required)

• printed double-sided

• Cerlox plastic comb binding in booklet form

• maximum 500 pages per volume

• full Table of Contents in each volume

• volume number on the cover (for example: 1 of 3 volumes)

• Sequential page numbering continues from the first volume to the last volume

This is the stuff that’s easiest to get right—if you plan for it before production starts.

6) Copies: plan for the minimum, then build in a buffer

Most filings require multiple paper copies for the Court, the justices, your records, and service.

Even when everything is perfect, producing multiple identical, bound sets takes coordination. If anything changes late, that’s when it becomes painful.

A simple “print-ready” check before you send files

Before you hit “send to printer,” confirm:

• Pagination is final and locked

• Table of Contents matches final page numbers

• You’ve done a quick page-by-page scroll for missing pages

• No one is swapping documents after numbering

• Scans are legible at 100%

• Volumes are planned to stay under 500 pages each

• Cover colour and binding method are confirmed