Canada’s New Anti-Spam Legislation: How Does It Affect Your Business?

Bill C-28, Canada’s anti-spam legislation, was recently passed and will go into effect later this year. While its intended target is deceptive forms of spam, Canadian small and medium-sized businesses need to be aware of the Act to ensure compliance when contacting potential customers, networking and developing marketing campaigns. Here are highlights of the important aspects of Bill C-28 that you and your employees should know:

Spam Definition

Spam is generally considered to be unsolicited bulk email from unknown or unwarranted senders. However, the new legislation does apply to the sending of “commercial electronic messages,” which may include email, text or instant messaging, and social media messages and other forms that we cannot consider spam. Many times, the information that is sent may not be considered spam by the sender, but may be viewed as spam by the recipient. It is important to think about how the message will be received at the other end before sending it. Hopefully regulations that have not yet been published will provide some additional details or thresholds to more easily define the scope of this term.

Express and Implied Consent

Electronic messages are not considered spam if the recipient has consented to receive the message, so it is important that you first determine whether or not you have the recipient’s approval to send the message. Consent comes in two forms: express and implied.

Express consent, as defined in the Law, is what is known as “opt-in” consent, by which the natural or legal person expressly agrees to be contacted before sending any communication. Typically, this would come in the form of subscribing to a newsletter, adding an email address to a written or electronic list, or checking a box to receive more information. This is a more viable option for business owners because those with a clearly stated interest are less likely to raise an issue.

Implied consent has broader use, which can actually be beneficial for sellers and small business owners, but could also be more difficult to prove if problems arise. According to the new Law, implied consent occurs when “[t]the person sending the message, the person causing it to be sent, or the person allowing it to be sent has an existing business relationship or an existing non-business relationship with the person to whom it is sent; (Bill C-28 Sec. 9a).

If a customer has purchased products or services from your company in the past two years, it is considered that there is an existing business relationship between you and your client, which would be an implied consent. There are Without time limit about the status of the relationship if the customer has given their express consent for future contact. In terms of express and implied consent, it is best to err on the side of caution and try to obtain the express consent of all users where possible..

ID

Messages should clearly tell the recipient who the message is from, while remaining consistent with the branding used when the recipient made initial contact with the company. There must not be any misleading information in the subject line that misrepresents the message or the sender. All messages must include the sender’s active contact information and mailing address.

Option to unsubscribe

Companies that have an email newsletter should have a clearly indicated unsubscribe option in each message so that users can easily stop future correspondence at any time. Some users may not know how to use the unsubscribe link, so it’s important to include your company contact information to ensure recipients can otherwise contact you to be removed from the mailing list. If a customer contacts you by other means to be removed from the list, manually unsubscribe the user and notify them of the removal immediately.

Small Business Tips

If you have a newsletter signup area on your website, make sure your database saves important information like name and date of signup, not just email address, so you can prove your consent if it comes up. a problem. Always provide your customers with your contact information in any messages sent, as well as the option to “opt out” or “unsubscribe” at any time. Customers should not automatically be placed in an email database, they should be able to choose whether or not they want to receive information from you. Don’t bombard your customers with messages, you can easily frustrate your customers if their inbox is constantly filled with messages from you. Setting up an account with email marketing software can ensure your messages comply with government regulations. Senders who do not comply with the new regulations can face serious fines, so make sure your messages are useful or informative to the user in some way, this will keep customers waiting for your correspondence and your database will grow.

More information on this important topic will be available when the regulations are published.