For example: it’s illegal for any company to request any PII when doing a return for a product, unless explicitly required to facilitate the return. For example, if someone needs to come to your place to pick up the return then requesting your address is within reason.
But if you bring the product back to the store, and have the receipt and payment method (debit/credit card) then it is illegal for them to refuse to process the return if you decline giving out your name, phone number, email address, home address, or any other PII.
Canadian Tire had a few lawsuits within the past decade regarding exactly that.
Stores still regularly insist on it saying “it’s store policy and they can’t return the item unless I give that info”, but I flat out tell them what they just asked is illegal under Canadian privacy laws and their tune quickly changes.
I used to work at London Drugs up until very recently and their POS systems still prompt for that information. I never asked for it simply because I felt it was an unnecessary violation of privacy but I was there for years and nobody mentioned it was actually illegal.
I’ve always felt they were very lacking and punishments seem to be just “the cost of doing business”. It has always felt like we had to take care of our own privacy and when that fails just hope that our system protects us. We are still quite behind in this digital world, at least we only pay lip service to entities like MPAA and RIAA
The world has changed so significantly in the timeframe I’m referencing. I’m not surprised its changed, but we definitely need to address this kind of thing as a country.
I used to manage my cell phone privacy by disabling data. Now thats included in my basic cell phone package, I need to be more proactive. As consumers, we need to be proactively choosing to engage with this ckntent, not just passively letting it wash over us. But thats easier said than done when the companies with the money to fight this are all pushing the version of the world where they feed off your data like parasites.
I’m sorry, what?? We have privacy protections?
Yes, we absolutely do.
For example: it’s illegal for any company to request any PII when doing a return for a product, unless explicitly required to facilitate the return. For example, if someone needs to come to your place to pick up the return then requesting your address is within reason.
But if you bring the product back to the store, and have the receipt and payment method (debit/credit card) then it is illegal for them to refuse to process the return if you decline giving out your name, phone number, email address, home address, or any other PII.
Canadian Tire had a few lawsuits within the past decade regarding exactly that.
Stores still regularly insist on it saying “it’s store policy and they can’t return the item unless I give that info”, but I flat out tell them what they just asked is illegal under Canadian privacy laws and their tune quickly changes.
I used to work at London Drugs up until very recently and their POS systems still prompt for that information. I never asked for it simply because I felt it was an unnecessary violation of privacy but I was there for years and nobody mentioned it was actually illegal.
We have some, but they’re pretty weaksauce compared to the EU’s, and the mechanisms for enforcing them don’t have enough teeth.
Wish our govt was more like the EU with the GDPR and other protections
GDPR is not properly enforced against us mega corpos…
But hey the intent was at least in the right direction and that’s the best we can hope for in 2025.
When I first came to Canada, around 2002, Canada had some of the most robust privacy protections in the world.
I’ve always felt they were very lacking and punishments seem to be just “the cost of doing business”. It has always felt like we had to take care of our own privacy and when that fails just hope that our system protects us. We are still quite behind in this digital world, at least we only pay lip service to entities like MPAA and RIAA
The world has changed so significantly in the timeframe I’m referencing. I’m not surprised its changed, but we definitely need to address this kind of thing as a country.
I used to manage my cell phone privacy by disabling data. Now thats included in my basic cell phone package, I need to be more proactive. As consumers, we need to be proactively choosing to engage with this ckntent, not just passively letting it wash over us. But thats easier said than done when the companies with the money to fight this are all pushing the version of the world where they feed off your data like parasites.