Evidence of meeting #35 for Industry, Science and Technology in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was e-mail.
A recording is available from Parliament.
5 p.m.
Conservative
Mike Wallace Conservative Burlington, ON
I'm going to take a minute to ask the Canadian Bankers Association--I appreciate their coming--about the personal right of action. For my personal clarification, and I'll give you a banking example, I get phished, and it's happened often, I'll be frank. I'm a TD Bank customer, so I get this e-mail that looks exactly as if the TD Bank sent it. It has their logo, it's got green...and somebody's trying to get into my account. They ask for my PIN number, or whatever the number is called, so they can check on that for me. Well, they're lying, obviously. It's not from the bank; it's somebody else trying to get that information from me.
Let's say I make a mistake and give them that information and they empty my bank account. Do I not have the right to sue those folks?
5:05 p.m.
General Counsel and Corporate Secretary, Canadian Bankers Association
I can tell you that in the past, banks consistently indemnified their clients who have suffered losses as a result of identity theft, and it's been the practice.
5:05 p.m.
Conservative
Mike Wallace Conservative Burlington, ON
So your solution is that the bank will cover me and put my money back in my bank account and I should be satisfied with that.
5:05 p.m.
General Counsel and Corporate Secretary, Canadian Bankers Association
Yes, that's always been the practice.
5:05 p.m.
Conservative
Mike Wallace Conservative Burlington, ON
Okay.
Another question I have for you is this. Unfortunately, or fortunately, I'm on both this committee and the finance committee, and of course we review the Bank Act, which we did a few years ago. The banks are not allowed to use information they have in their branches to sell me insurance they may be providing. Not all banks provide insurance products, but some do. If my e-mail address is online for my bank, provided for mortgage purposes and other purposes, is it the bank's right to use that to send me information about insurance products they would like to sell me? Does the Bankers Association have a position on that?
5:05 p.m.
Assistant General Counsel and Foreign Bank Secretary, Canadian Bankers Association
All I can say, Mr. Wallace, is that, as I'm sure you would appreciate, all our member banks follow exactly what they're required to do under the Bank Act and the regulations, including the insurance regulations.
5:05 p.m.
Voices
Oh, oh!
5:05 p.m.
Conservative
5:05 p.m.
Assistant General Counsel and Foreign Bank Secretary, Canadian Bankers Association
I'm pleased it's a good answer.
5:05 p.m.
Voices
Oh, oh!
5:05 p.m.
Conservative
Mike Wallace Conservative Burlington, ON
We're starting to have an interesting discussion about whether the banks can use the Internet to sell insurance when they're not allowed to sell it through the branches. I'm concerned about their using the personal information they have from me to sell me insurance--or we change the law, one of the two.
We've heard the issue about the 18 months before, Mr. Misener, and it's consistent with the do-not-call list legislation we have here in Canada. That's my understanding, that it's consistent. One thing you didn't comment on, and maybe you can or can't, but there has been some suggestion that if you want to get off a list, you inform the supplier, and they have 10 days to take you off the list in this legislation. Some people have come to say this is too quick, and it should be 31 days. Does your organization have any issue with it staying at 10 days?
5:05 p.m.
Vice-President, Global Public Policy, Amazon.com
Thirty-one would certainly give us more confidence, but I think we can live with 10. There are unsubscribing mechanisms in every e-mail we send to our customers, as well as on the website. You can choose to opt out of receiving any e-mail whatsoever, including legal notices. Different mechanisms are available for our customers to opt out of receiving e-mails, as well as to opt in to receiving e-mails. There are a number of services that we provide our customers whereby they can specify the kinds of e-mail they would like to receive from us. We believe this is the best balance for our customers.
5:05 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Michael Chong
Thank you very much, Mr. Wallace.
Thank you, Mr. Misener.
Monsieur Vincent.
5:05 p.m.
Bloc
Robert Vincent Bloc Shefford, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Welcome. I have a question for Ms. Clark.
Earlier, you said something that surprised me somewhat. You talked about sharing email address lists with other bank affiliates. As Mr. Wallace pointed out, these addresses are personal information. We were talking about mortgages in this case.
What reason would you have for wanting to convey personal information of this nature to other bank affiliates? Who might these affiliates be and why would it be important for you to pass along personal information to parties other than the ones to whom that information was initially entrusted?
5:05 p.m.
General Counsel and Corporate Secretary, Canadian Bankers Association
We are recommending that the bill be amended to allow the bank, which has an existing business relationship with its customer, to share information with some of its affiliates, in order to take a more holistic approach, so to speak, with customers. Quite often, the bank's goal is to provide the best possible service to its customers, and consequently, to provide more comprehensive services or financial advice. Our goal is to give a bank the opportunity to offer services to its customers when a need has been identified. To our minds, this is a totally legitimate business practice.
As for the other affiliates with which the bank might share this information, we can think of investment opportunities and advice offered by certain financial planners to enhance a consumer's position. Obviously, we always have the interests of our customers at heart and our goal is to provide comprehensive service so that they are aware of their personal financial situation and enjoy the best possible relationship with the bank and its financial services.
5:10 p.m.
Bloc
Robert Vincent Bloc Shefford, QC
For example, if I do business with you, it doesn't mean that I need a financial adviser who is going to try and sell me an RRSP or some such thing. If I have a business relationship with you, there is a specific reason for it and it is not because I want to have five or ten business relationships with affiliates of the bank that want to sell me their products. Among other things, that is one of the reasons why we want to minimize this possibility. I think that is how Option consommateurs views the situation.
I agree with you that legitimate marketing activities should be allowed in order to maintain a relationship with the customer. It is not a matter of breaking off all ties with him or her. If I have a direct relationship with you and I consent to maintaining that relationship, then there is no problem. As Mr. Gray and Mr. Kee were saying, it is important to continue doing business with the customer. These days, electronic commerce is, in my opinion, the easiest way of doing that. If we impose restrictions at this time, some foreign companies will not stop their electronic commerce activities, all the more so since the door will be wide open to them.
Mr. Gray or Mr. Kee, would either one of you care to comment?
5:10 p.m.
Director, Policy and Legal Affairs, Entertainment Software Associaton of Canada, Canadian Intellectual Property Council
Could you ask the question again? Sorry, I missed part of it.
5:10 p.m.
Bloc
Robert Vincent Bloc Shefford, QC
We discussed business relationships with consumers, legitimate marketing practices and the fact the foreigners could continue their commerce and that the bill would restrict electronic commerce opportunities for Quebeckers and Canadians. I'd like to hear your take on the situation.
5:10 p.m.
Director, Policy and Legal Affairs, Entertainment Software Associaton of Canada, Canadian Intellectual Property Council
I believe it could have a negative effect. The thrust of the point I was trying to make earlier is with respect to determining to what extent the problematic spam and other issues are emerging from Canada vis-à-vis the rest of the world and to what extent we can take effective measures to address those kinds of issues vis-à-vis the kind of cost we're imposing.
As a consequence, it's entirely feasible that at least operations that are well outside of Canada's jurisdiction, like some egregious spammer who may be located in Russia, for example, may be outside or at least beyond the scope of what we can effectively do to address the issue.
5:10 p.m.
Conservative
5:10 p.m.
Conservative
Chris Warkentin Conservative Peace River, AB
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I thank all of you for coming in this afternoon. We appreciate your testimony. We continue to try to build a piece of legislation that will effectively work for consumers but not cut out business. We thank you for your different contributions.
I want to bring it back to the discussion about the length of time we would include implied consent. Mr. Misener, you talked about the arbitrary sense of 18 months. You give an option of five to seven years. You haven't explained why five to seven years. I was wondering if that was related to your assessment of your own industry in terms of what length of time somebody would come back for a second transaction. I'm wondering if you know that specific statistic of your company as to what length of time it usually is between the time in which a person makes an initial contact and when they'll come back to make a second purchase.
5:15 p.m.
Vice-President, Global Public Policy, Amazon.com
Thank you for the question, sir.
My suggestion of it being somewhere around the order of five to seven years was based on the producer cycles and the product life cycles. As producers, we sell the works of Canadian authors, and we promote Canadian bands on our website. We would want those bands to have their new releases available to people who have already purchased earlier releases and are known to them without coming back to the website.