Pest Control in Richmond, BC

For treatment, a pest control company: see rodent control. The City took over general rodent work from Vancouver Coastal Health in 2021, and its 24-hour rodent line, 604-276-4316, takes questions and complaints. Its 2022 report describes free exterior assessments with advice on private property, not treatment, and its 2026 summary doesn’t list them, so ask the line what’s on offer. A rodent problem at a restaurant or grocery store goes to Vancouver Coastal Health’s Richmond office at 604-233-3147. Keeping rodents out is the property’s side of it: if an order under Bylaw 6989 is ignored, the City can do the work and bill the owner.

No public agency publishes that comparison, as far as we could find; the “rattiest city” rankings in the news are a pest company’s own. City staff called 2021’s rodent enquiries well distributed across Richmond, apart from the central-east, which they thought was likely down to its farmland, and said the numbers matched Vancouver Coastal Health’s past years. They also noted a high number of complaints after building demolitions, which displace rodents, and the City’s newest figures count 72 community enquiries in 2025, down from 93. So the useful question is what’s around your own building: stored material, open food waste, bird feeders, and openings over 6 mm, the size the City says to seal.

Yes, within B.C.’s limits. The City’s rodenticide ban applied to City-owned property, not private land; its page gives an end date of March 28, 2024, and we found no later decision. B.C. limits second-generation anticoagulants to essential service locations, such as farms and food retail, and only after practical alternatives have failed. They’re no longer allowed at homes, offices or retail shops that aren’t essential services, though the Province says companies can still offer trapping or other baits within an integrated approach, with rodenticide as a last resort.

Yes, on private property: see wildlife control. The City sends raccoons, skunks, squirrels and possums to a private pest control company. Its raccoon sheet says they may seek out dry, quiet, dark cavities in structures, and that the entry should be sealed once the den is vacant, which we quote as exclusion work. The Province says poisoning them is an offence and that a landowner needs no permit to trap raccoons damaging their property, though municipal bylaws may still apply.

Often crows, skunks or raccoons after European chafer grubs. The City says the major damage comes from animals digging for the grubs, that Bylaw 8514 allows no insecticide on chafer, and that nematodes work best from mid to the end of July, when the larvae are small. Japanese beetle is a separate matter: no part of Richmond is in the CFIA’s regulated areas effective June 1, 2026, and its detection table shows one Richmond beetle, in 2022. We treat chafer too; ask the office about your lawn.

No. Pesticide Use Control Bylaw 8514 bars pesticides for maintaining outdoor plants and turf on private residential and City land. It doesn’t reach buildings or the inside of buildings, pests that affect agriculture, or pests that transmit disease to people or animals. The City grants no infestation permits, and says residents and strata councils must make sure their contractors follow it. Indoors, the Province’s rule is notice: at least 72 hours before using a pesticide in an occupied home, a licensee must give a treatment notice. To get ready, use the preparation sheets.

An inspection by us costs $150 + GST at a house and $125 + GST at a condo, apartment or townhouse. Commercial site inspections are free, and so are estimates over the phone. An attic or crawl space adds $50, waived if you book the service the same day. Our three-visit rodent program runs $495–$650 + GST for a house and $395–$495 + GST for a condo. Cockroach gel baiting, dusting and monitoring is $250–$350 + GST, and K9 bed bug detection for one unit is $195–$275 + GST. An exterminator’s final price depends on the pest and the building, so ask for the estimate first.

Usually the landlord. Insects such as bed bugs are generally the landlord’s to control, the Residential Tenancy Branch says, and Vancouver Coastal Health says landlords must hire a licensed operator to apply pesticides in rental suites. Rodents are less clear: the Branch points to municipal standards, and Richmond’s rental standards bylaw doesn’t name pests. For the treatment, see bed bug control; our K9 teams do the detection first.

Yes. Bulletin BUILDING-55, headed for demolition and house moves, asks for a Rodent Abatement and Control Declaration or a summary report from a licensed pest control company, submitted no more than two weeks before the demolition permit is issued. Form PL-56 asks for a B.C. structural pesticide licence number and a City of Richmond business licence number, with an optional line for a Metro West inter-municipal licence. The City’s reason is that demolishing an infested house can cause a local spike in rodent conflicts; it reports reviewing 137 demolition sites in 2025, with about 70% needing no control. Building Approvals is at 604-276-4118. What our visits involve is on our rodent abatement for demolition page.