Canada — provincial consumer protection acts and the federal Competition Act

The clocks it starts

• Canada: withdrawal window (7 days)Quebec's distance-contract regime is the strongest in Canada. Where the merchant did not disclose the required information before the contract, or did not send a copy of the contract afterwards, the consumer may cancel — and Quebec goes further than anywhere else in Canada by giving the consumer a statutory right to require the CARD ISSUER to reverse the charge where the merchant fails to refund within the statutory period. Outside Quebec the applicable period and conditions are those of your own province's Act. It reaches: distance contracts governed by the Quebec Consumer Protection Act, where the merchant failed to disclose the information the Act requires before the contract was made. Consumer protection is provincial in Canada: this module states the Quebec position because it is the most protective and the most clearly drafted, and flags Ontario and the federal layer. Check your own province's Act.Consumer Protection Act (Quebec), ss. 54.8–54.16Filing window
• General civil limitation period (varies — check locally)Limitation periods for consumer contract claims in the countries in this file range from about one year to ten and are not something we state per country. Two years is shown as a prompt to check, not as the law. A continuing course of charges usually restarts the clock, so a subscription still billing is rarely out of time.Limitation period

What it entitles you to, beyond money

• Cancellation, effective from the date of your noticeSend a dated written cancellation naming the account, the subscription and the date you want it to end, and keep the proof. Say in terms that any further charge is unauthorised — that sentence is what turns the next debit into a payment dispute you can win without arguing about the subscription at all.ss. 54.1–54.16 — distance contracts, the consumer's right to cancel, and chargeback where the merchant does not refund; s. 230 — prohibition on negative-option billing
• Revocation of the payment authority with your bankDo not rely on the merchant to stop billing. Tell the card issuer or bank to cancel the recurring authority and to block further authorisations from that merchant descriptor. This works even where the merchant is unresponsive and even where it is abroad.

What the other side will say

Each of these is a refusal this regime lets a counterparty attempt, paired with the answer to it. Reading them before you write is worth more than any amount of polish on the letter itself.

Where to take it next

1. 01Written cancellation and refund demand to the traderOne document: cancel, demand refund of anything taken after your first cancellation attempt, cite the instrument named in this result, and give a short deadline. Ask for written confirmation of the cancellation date — that document is what every later step needs.Claim direct·typically 14 days
2. 02Card dispute for the post-cancellation chargesRun this in parallel rather than afterwards. Scheme dispute windows are commonly 120 days from the charge, which is shorter than any consumer-protection route, and a reversal obtained here does not prejudice the rest of the claim.Claim direct·typically 45 days
3. 03The provincial consumer protection office, and the Competition Bureau for misleading representationsQuebec's Office de la protection du consommateur and its provincial equivalents take individual complaints and mediate them; the Competition Bureau takes complaints about misleading representations but acts on patterns rather than individual claims. It will take your individual complaint, so file it as one: the merchant, the dates, the amounts, and what you want.Regulator·typically 60 days·official page
4. 04The provincial small claims court (Quebec: Division des petites créances)Binding on themSmall claims procedures across Canada handle consumer contract claims without lawyers for a modest fee. Quebec's small claims division expressly excludes lawyers, which levels the field against a corporate defendant.Small claims·typically 180 days