project manager

technician

water technician

carpenter

travel manager

Belfor

I joined BELFOR believing in the mission and the people doing the work on the ground. The branch teams across BC are hardworking, committed, and genuinely care about client service and safety in high-risk environments.

Unfortunately, the corporate experience did not match what was represented during hiring.

Numerous commitments made at the time of hire, including resources, support, tools, and role clarity were not followed through on. As responsibilities expanded and expectations increased, the promised support never materialized. Instead, workload intensified without adequate staffing, guidance, or infrastructure, creating an unsustainable environment.

When the stress of the role began to take a toll, there was no meaningful corporate or HR support. Requests for clarity, prioritization, and assistance were met with deflection rather than solutions. HR and Director of HSE positioned themselves as a support channel but demonstrated limited understanding of employment standards, occupational health and safety obligations, and duty-to-accommodate processes.

At a corporate level, there is a clear disconnect between leadership expectations and operational reality. Critical health and safety compliance gaps were minimized or deprioritized when raised, despite the inherent risks of the industry. Rather than addressing systemic issues, the culture favored moving on quickly instead of fixing root causes.

The hardest part of the job was not the work itself, it was navigating a corporate environment where follow-through, accountability, and psychological safety were lacking, and controlled by a fleet manager with lacking knowledge. 

The most positive aspect of the role was working alongside branch teams who consistently showed professionalism, integrity, and resilience despite limited corporate support. They deserve leadership that matches their effort and commitment.


Out the door, this company makes a lot of promises they generally can't keep. While I've heard tale that Belfor was once great to work with, they've really dropped the ball in recent years. 

Poor communication throughout management to both their own team and other branches, unreasonable expectations of labourers (expects workers to look presentable 100% of the time but we work in restoration with no environmental protections? Of course your workers are going to their next job drenched in water, you sent them into a flood with no boots and no change of uniform), wasteful of people's time and resources, and incredibly inappropriate, two-faced behaviour from team leads. 

Management and corporate has obvious favourites and people they clearly want to get rid of but can't for logistical reasons, will lie to your face about your own hours and performance (despite the great reviews they push you to get them naming you specifically), and will drop new hires incredibly easily. Aside from 2 legacy hires, maybe 3 people on their current team have managed to stick around for 2 or more years at a dollar or so above minimum wage, and the rest of the team is made up of a handful of hire's who'll be lucky to make it 6 months in.

The miscommunication is so bad at the Windsor location, which keep in mind is the head office of the company, that when people are sent for training at other, more prestigious branches, they essentially have to be untrained when they return because nothing is done by the books. Also, a third of the warehouse is taken up by the president's boat, and the hire ups will make you detail their very nice, very expensive non-work vehicles then charge it as "shop hours". Complete joke of a company. 


I have been with Belfor in British Columbia for about 4 months and during the time I have down everything from cleaning equipment to investigating fires to rebuilds from damages (fire/water/mold etc.) I really enjoy the management at the branch I am at however sometimes you will get a lack of information going into a job. Through the time I have been there I have worked hard and been rewarded, I started as a general laborer and in that time I worked hard and had a positive attitude and now they are paying for my water certification and other certifications in the future. The on call that everyone complains about isn't that bad, considering they all say every 5th week is tough. Our branch does 1 week rotations and for the most part I work on call through all the weeks, which does limit your free time however if you are willing to work hard and show commitment and dedication you will be rewarded.

To sum it all up, most people that say there is no room to grow that is a lie, it's either you didn't work very hard or you just had a tough situation. By all means going to a branch with 100+ employees it will be very hard to grow compared to a smaller branch just because it will be hard to get noticed and you won't see a Project Manager too often in that situation but in a smaller branch it's daily conversations.
Great company to work for as long as you devote yourself and work hard and have a good attitude, very physically demanding though.

Overall the job is Okay. If you miss high school this is the place for you! 
You get to go all over and do different things. Great exercise, most days.
Some of the people are a real joy to work with but, most of the Crew Chiefs are lazy, sit on their phones taking selfies, and try to seem busy with their paper work, or you just cant find them because they're hiding somewhere.

This job is great if you don't have kids or a life for that matter.
They take advantage of the hours you work. 
You can do a full day time shift 8-430, then be placed right after for yet another 8 hour shift.
They have On Call and Back Up Crews as they're a 24 hour business. At times you will be called out on a weekend and its not even an emergency which is a real damper and can be frustrating.

They do a very poor job at placing people at jobs someone else has started and not finished, without any real explanation of what needs to be redone or completed.

They do safety meetings at each job daily but, safety isn't any real concern to them.

A lot of the employees including higher up LOVE to gossip! So its best to keep your mouth shut and not give out to much info about yourself or any grievances you may have.
If you aren't part of a circle right away be prepared to deal with lots of uncomfortable situations.

Some of the higher up staff have made myself personally feel uncomfortable and even intimidated. Like i couldn't talk to them.
                 **Power goes to some peoples heads.**

My days was warehouse work unloading or loading truck and crates, cleaning and wrapping/boxing all kinds of items from homes. Going through houses belongings that were damaged from either flooding (mould), fire (suet), or sewage back-up (sewage) and listing all items that were salvageable or disposable content. Someways I would go to the damaged home with the crew and list and box or toss content on scene and do demolition work. I learned details of damage to homes and the effects it has to the framing of the houses and the effects the damage has on people.
Some co workers were like family, honest, hard working, and friendly. Some were difficult, to be brutally honest the would stab each other in the back, take everyday as free pay to sit back and relax, and steal belongings from Belfor. 
Management was disappointing, nothing was being done about unfair treatment between coworkers. 
The hardest part was working in an environment that has a good title throughout the city but behind the face was a huge problem between almost all staff. 
The best part was meeting the few that were great to work with that supported each other, and learning so much more about the damage water and fire can do to peoples lives and homes.

Working at Belfor, the only positives were access to the truck outside of work hours (everyone uses them even though they aren't supposed to outside of work hours) but once you accept the truck, you are expected to be on call 24/7 for atleast 2 weeks a month.
Sounds like a good opportunity to make extra O/T, but it's not. Sometimes calls don't come in, so you are just expected to stay home ready to work every night.
The management is a complete joke. It's more common to go to a job and have things not ready than it is for things to be ready. You end up spending alot of time making calls and fixing problems that never would occur if the project managers did their job. 
No matter how hard you work, don't expect to move up - in wage or position. They bring you in at a slave wage, and that's where you can expect to stay.
The work culture is toxic. Everyone talks about everyone, and everyone is completely two faced. It's almost like highschool. There are some good people that work there, but most of them will stab you in the back for anything they can. 

What is the best part of working at the company?
I enjoyed working at Belfor for years until the last manager he’s a hot head he had no idea what he was doing and the estimators are a joke especially when they argue with a lead carpenter on the scope of work that is missing a bunch of stuff and gets mad because you called him out on it what a joke

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
The change of management left everyone wondering what was really going on I mean four different managers in five years come on how much are you supposed to put up with

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
Besides management not knowing what’s going on and some of the workers just being there for a pay check and not doing their jobs leaving it for guys like me

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
You never knew what you were doing from one day to the next and they could change in the middle of the day so pack up all the tools drive to the other end of the city only to find out the job you have been sent to do is already done

Was a good company to work for. Long hours, decent pay. 12 hour days, for up to seven days a week. I enjoyed working there. 

We completed fixing the Calgary Zoo in less then 3 weeks. Tools needed to fix the Zoo were a little slow getting there, and not much time for any-thing other then work, but those were really the only negative points of working for the company.

They provided safety gear (P.P.E.), and even provided lunch and water. They were not overly pushy and assignments were completed in a timely fashion. Took a few days for everything to be better organized, but after that it ran very smoothly. 

I would definitely recommend this company.

I definitely wished I could have had better Project Managers!
I have over 25 year’s experience in construction both field and management my last job was a Department Head Supervisor so I know a thing or two…so I thought I made an effort to help the management there and just got disrespected just project management basics are not done, not to mention none of the project management have experience in construction past a few year’s or ever ran a business in construction or have proper education at the very least from what I experienced, so why are you hired to project manage?
I’m happy to get away from the “hurry! hurry! stop!” Method of management!
I would definitely recommend reconsidering working for them if you are looking for stress free environment.
This was happening at my branch so I can’t speak for other branches at all, I just wish they would learn to not hire people with proper experience or at least train them properly!

I worked for Belfor Property Restoration for 8 years. 6 years out of the Surrey branch and 2 years out of the Edmonton branch. A typical day a work in Surrey would be packing up contents after a flood or fire or a natural disaster. I learned alot from this job such as how to assess items that would be able to be saved or written off as a Non restorable item depending on if the item was damaged or not. Management seemed fair but the wage was not great but I worked alot of overtime for other people within the company(since they didnt want to do it). It was fine in BC I did work many overtime hours and I really loved what I did, Helping people pick up the pieces after a disaster such as a flood or fire. I enjoyed doing my job since I am a very hard worker and enjoyed the use of the van and supplies we had available for any job I had to do.

Top Job Titles	Average salary
Project manager 47 salaries reported	$71,649 per year
Technician 33 salaries reported	$23.24 per hour
Water technician 3 salaries reported	$27.67 per hour
Carpenter 3 salaries reported	$30.50 per hour
Travel manager 39 salaries reported	$22.50 per hour

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