Car Lockout Vancouver: Locked Keys in Car 24/7

Keys on the seat, keys in the trunk, or a door that locked itself while the engine was running. We open the car without breaking the window, scratching the paint or tearing the weather seal, and we do it across Vancouver at any hour.

If the keys are not in the car but genuinely lost, opening the door is only half the problem. That is car key replacement, or all keys lost if there is no spare anywhere. Tell us which one it is on the phone and we bring the right van.

A car lockout is $80-$160 during standard hours, the same band as a home or business lockout. The entry itself usually takes 5-15 minutes once we are at the car.

• Lockout, standard hours: $80-$160
• After-hours labour, 5-9 pm: $150
• After-hours labour, 9 pm to 8:30 am: $250/hour

We dispatch from 4105 Macdonald St, and the drive depends on where the car is. Traffic, bridges and parkade access change that, and we give you a real window on the phone rather than a slogan. Other cities are further out and their windows are listed on the service areas page. The after-hours rate is quoted before we dispatch, never added afterwards, and it matches the prices page.

• Try every door and the tailgate. The one you did not try is unlocked more often than people expect.
• Look for a spare within driving distance. A partner or a friend with the second key is faster than any locksmith.
• Check the car's app. Many manufacturers offer remote unlock from your phone, and it is free.
• Check your roadside cover. Insurance, a credit card or the manufacturer often already covers a lockout.

If none of those works, call 604-734-7233 and say whether the keys are visible in the car or genuinely lost. A lockout is a short visit; a lost key is a car key replacement, priced $180-$280 for a transponder key and $280-$420 for a smart key.

Modern car doors are opened with a wedge and a long reach tool: the frame is eased just far enough to pass a rod in, and the interior handle, lock button or unlock switch is worked from inside. Nothing is forced through the glass and nothing is drilled.

On some vehicles the safer route is the lock cylinder itself, which we pick rather than pry. Cars with fully frameless glass, laminated side windows or heavily loaded door skins get the cylinder method by default. If we judge that a car cannot be opened without risk, we say so before touching it rather than after.

We do not open a vehicle for anyone who cannot show it is theirs. Registration, insurance papers or a license matching the vehicle record is asked for on every job, including yours.

The coat-hanger and slim-jim advice was written for cars built before the mid 1990s. A modern door holds the side-curtain airbag, the window and mirror wiring, the lock actuator and the weather seal, and a wire pushed blind past the glass finds all of them. The lock linkage is shielded to stop exactly that technique, so the attempt is both damaging and futile. We regularly see doors where one attempt cost more to repair than several lockouts would have.

Keys in the trunk is a different job from keys on the seat. On most cars we open the cabin first, then release the trunk from the interior lever, the seat pass-through or the release inside the glovebox. That keeps the trunk lock untouched.

Where there is no interior release, the trunk cylinder is picked directly. Wagons, hatchbacks and vans with a separate cargo barrier take longer, and electric trunk lids on a flat battery may need the vehicle jumped before the latch will move. Tell dispatch it is a trunk lockout when you call so we arrive with the right tools rather than discovering it at the curb.

• The exact location. Street address, or the parkade name and level. Underground levels have poor phone signal, so agree a meeting point before you go down.
• Year, make and model. It decides which entry tool comes out of the van.
• Proof the car is yours. Registration or insurance papers, plus photo ID.
• Whether a child or a pet is inside. Say it first. That call goes to the front of the queue, and if it is urgent enough we will tell you to ring emergency services rather than wait for us.
• Whether the engine is running. A running car with locked doors is common and safe to open, but we plan the job differently.
• Whether the keys are visible. Seat, footwell or trunk changes the method.

Downtown parkades, mall and grocery lots, Kitsilano and Jericho beach parking, the UBC and Point Grey area, Oakridge, Mount Pleasant, Kerrisdale and roadside on Broadway, Granville and Kingsway. Driveways and street parking are all normal work for us, and so is a car on a ferry queue or a gas station forecourt.

The rest of the automotive service, including keys, fobs and ignitions, is on the automotive locksmith hub, and after-hours calls of every kind go through emergency locksmith.

A spare key kept somewhere other than your pocket is the whole fix. With a working key, a spare is a routine appointment rather than a call-out: $180-$240 for a transponder spare, on car key duplication. Think carefully about a magnetic key box on the car, because whoever finds it gets the key too. If you use one, put only a door key in it, with no chip.