How to book a lab appointment in British Columbia, and what to know before you go

By Young Kim, CEO, TSB HealthCare · Published September 25, 2026

Why booking a lab visit in British Columbia can feel confusing

A laboratory requisition in British Columbia gets you started. It does not point to a single booking website. The province has more than one laboratory network, and each network schedules its own locations. When someone says “book a lab appointment,” the hard part is usually matching the form in your hand to the right site and the right page.

Most outpatient laboratory visits follow one of two routes:

• Participating public and hospital outpatient laboratories, booked on LabOnlineBooking.ca.
• LifeLabs Patient Service Centres, booked on appointments.lifelabs.com.

Both routes exist so people can complete laboratory testing. They are separate systems. Your requisition, the test written on it, and the services a location actually offers decide which route applies. If you are unsure which network your form belongs to, ask the clinician who ordered the test before you book.

Public and hospital outpatient labs: LabOnlineBooking.ca

LabOnlineBooking.ca is the patient scheduling site for participating public and hospital outpatient laboratories in British Columbia. Operated by TSB HealthCare since 2018, it has been 8.5 yrs in production. It books and now manages the visit across four BC health organizations from one platform. You use it to look up a participating location, choose a time, and receive a confirmation. The laboratory you select collects the sample and carries out the testing. The website does not.

The platform covers 69 active outpatient sites. It has booked 4.01M appointments for 820,105 distinct patients. The week of 14–19 Sep accounted for 16,958 bookings.

How to book on LabOnlineBooking.ca

1. Get a laboratory requisition from your doctor, nurse practitioner, or other ordering clinician. The laboratory needs that form, and the form is what tells you which kind of site can do the work.
2. Open LabOnlineBooking.ca and search the participating public and hospital outpatient locations.
3. Choose a location, then a date and time you can attend. Prefer a site that can perform the test on your requisition, not only the one with the earliest opening.
4. Complete the booking on that site.
5. Keep the confirmation. A reminder often follows by email or text.
6. Attend the laboratory you selected at the booked time, with your requisition and anything the confirmation asks you to bring.

If you are booking for a family member, use their requisition and their details, and book only with their knowledge.

LifeLabs Patient Service Centres

LifeLabs runs its own community collection network of Patient Service Centres across British Columbia. Those centres are booked through LifeLabs, at appointments.lifelabs.com. That system belongs to LifeLabs. It is independent of LabOnlineBooking.ca, and TSB HealthCare does not operate it. LifeLabs is a trademark of its owner.

How to book a LifeLabs appointment

1. Have your laboratory requisition with you before you start.
2. Go to LifeLabs’ booking site, appointments.lifelabs.com.
3. Search by address, city, or postal code.
4. Choose a LifeLabs Patient Service Centre from the results.
5. Select an available date and time.
6. Keep the confirmation. LifeLabs commonly sends it by email or text.
7. Attend that Patient Service Centre for the visit.

Confirm the test and the requisition before you go

A reserved time only helps if that location performs the test and accepts your requisition. Services differ by site. An open slot is not, by itself, proof that the location can run the order you were given.

Before you confirm a time, and again before you travel, check both of these:

• The location offers the specific test on your requisition.
• The location accepts that requisition.

If the booking page does not say, check the laboratory’s own information or ask the clinician who ordered the test. Showing up at the wrong network usually means starting the search again.

Walk-in visits are a separate arrangement, and they are not the same at every community site. Some LifeLabs Patient Service Centres see people who have not booked. Whether a walk-in is available changes by location, so read the current note for that centre on the LifeLabs site before you count on one. For participating public and hospital outpatient laboratories, plan on the time you book through LabOnlineBooking.ca unless that location has told you it will see you without one.

Easier booking is there so the test gets done

Two networks give people in British Columbia more than one way to reach laboratory testing. When a nearby site and a workable time are easy to find, more of the tests clinicians order are actually completed. That is the practical result: laboratory results that can come back in time to support care for patients, the families around them, and the wider community.

Patients book participating sites on LabOnlineBooking.ca. For how a booking entry point fits the rest of access, see why a digital front door is more than a website, the patient flow management guide, and how to reduce patient no-shows. Laboratories can see the same scheduling platform on the diagnostic labs page.

What LabOnlineBooking.ca is, and what it is not

LabOnlineBooking.ca is a scheduling platform for participating public and hospital outpatient laboratory locations. It does not collect samples, and it does not perform laboratory testing. This page is administrative guidance for booking a visit. It does not include personal health information or clinical advice. LifeLabs is an independent laboratory provider. LifeLabs is not affiliated with LabOnlineBooking.ca or with TSB HealthCare, and LifeLabs is a trademark of its respective owner.