The Canadian Anti-Spam Law regulates email marketing in Canada, and has been in effect since July 1 2014. Wherever you are in the world, if you send email marketing messages to Canadian residents, you will need to comply with CASL.
All emails sent to Canadian recipients must contain the following:
- Your name, the person on whose behalf you are sending (if acting as an affiliate), your physical mailing address and contact information (email address, telephone number and URL).
- An unsubscribe link, which is simple, quick, and easy to action. It should not require a log-in to action.
You must have consent to contact a subscriber. That consent can be either implied or express.
Implied consent applies when you have an existing business relationship with the receiver. In short, this is applicable when:
- They have purchased a product/service from you within the last two years.
- They have enquired about purchasing a product/service from you within the last six months.
- You're a charity or political organisation/candidate and the receiver has sent a donation, or completed charity work, or they have attended a meeting within the past two years.
- You're a club/association/voluntary organisation and the person you are contacting is a member.
Express consent means a written or oral agreement to receive specific types of messages. For example, "You want to receive monthly newsletters and weekly discount notifications from Company B."
Express consent is only valid if the following information is included with your request for consent:
- A clear and concise description of your purpose for obtaining consent.
- A description of messages you'll be sending.
- Requestor's name and contact information (physical mailing address and telephone number, email address or website URL).
- A statement that the recipient may unsubscribe at any time.
If you are collecting an email address as part of a sign-up or purchase flow, then you cannot use pre-checked checkboxes to get express consent. Consent must be freely given.
The penalties under CASL can be quite severe. They include:
- Administrative Monetary Penalties (AMPs) consisting of fines of up to $1 million for individuals and up to $10 million for corporations per violation.
- Vicarious liability. This means that corporate directors can be found to be liable for the wrongful acts of a corporation or organization, and the corporation can be found to be liable for the wrongful acts of its employees.
- Private rights of action. This means that after July 1 2017 individuals can sue another individual or organization for damages after proving actual harm or loss after receiving an unsolicited and unwanted commercial electronic message (CEM). An individual cannot sue an organization if the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) has already taken action against it.