Privacy Policy

As required under Québec law, Metallic Auto has designated a Person in Charge of the Protection of Personal Information (our Privacy Officer). This person oversees the application of this Privacy Policy and handles access, correction, withdrawal-of-consent, de-indexing and complaint requests.

• Title: Person in Charge of the Protection of Personal Information (Privacy Officer), Metallic Auto
• Email: privacy@metallicauto.ca
• Telephone: +1 (438) 951-1515

The Privacy Officer is your first point of contact for any question or concern about how your personal information is handled.

This Privacy Policy applies to personal information collected through the Website, by email, by telephone, by text message and through any online form we make available, as well as to information collected in person at our premises in connection with a Website inquiry.

“Personal information” means any information which relates to a natural person and allows that person to be identified, directly or indirectly, whether or not it is recorded in a document.

This Policy does not apply to third-party websites, marketplaces, social media platforms or advertising listings that we do not control, even where a link to them appears on the Website. Their own privacy policies govern your use of those services.

3.1 Browsing the Website

You may browse our vehicle inventory, view vehicle detail pages and use our search and filter tools without providing any personal information. We do not require account creation, registration or login, and we do not maintain user profiles, passwords or account credentials.

Our Website is delivered through hosting and content-delivery service providers. Like virtually all websites, their servers automatically record limited technical data as part of delivering pages and protecting the service against abuse. This may include your IP address, browser type and version, device and operating system type, referring page, requested pages and the date and time of your request. This technical data is used for security, fraud and abuse prevention, error diagnosis and operational reliability, and is not used by us to build a profile of you.

3.2 Information You Voluntarily Provide

When you contact us through a Website form, by email, by telephone or by text message, we collect the information you choose to give us, which may include:

• Your first and last name;
• Email address;
• Telephone number;
• The vehicle, stock number or VIN you are interested in;
• Details about a trade-in or a vehicle or service request;
• The content of your message and of any subsequent correspondence with us; and
• Any other information you voluntarily choose to include.

Please do not send us sensitive personal information (such as a social insurance number, driver’s licence number, banking details, credit or financial information, or health information) through the Website or by email. If a transaction or credit application later requires such information, we will collect it directly through an appropriate secure channel, with the specific consent required by law.

3.3 Vehicle Inventory Information

Vehicle listing information, such as make, model, year, mileage, VIN, color and photographs, generally relates to the vehicle rather than to an individual. We take reasonable measures not to publish personal information about previous owners.

3.4 Information We Do Not Collect

We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 14 years of age. We do not use profiling, location tracking or automated decision-making that produces legal or similarly significant effects about you, and we do not use technology that allows a person to be identified, located or profiled (such as biometrics or geolocation tracking) through the Website.

In accordance with Québec law, we collect only the personal information that is necessary for the purposes we determine before collection. Where you provide personal information, we use it to:

• Respond to your inquiry, question or request for information;
• Provide information about a vehicle, its availability, its condition or its price;
• Arrange a viewing, a test drive, an appraisal or an appointment;
• Communicate with you about a vehicle purchase, trade-in or related service;
• Maintain accurate business, transaction and after-sales records;
• Operate, maintain, secure and improve the Website and our services;
• Prevent, detect and investigate fraud, abuse and security incidents;
• Establish, exercise or defend legal claims and resolve disputes; and
• Comply with applicable legal, regulatory, tax, consumer-protection and vehicle-registration obligations.

We will not use your personal information for a new purpose that is not consistent with those listed above without first informing you and, where the law requires it, obtaining your consent.

We collect, use and disclose personal information with your consent, except where the law permits or requires us to do so without it (for example to prevent fraud, to comply with a legal obligation, or in the context of legal proceedings).

When you voluntarily submit an inquiry to us, you consent to our use of that information to respond to you. Consent for any use beyond what is necessary to respond to your request — such as marketing communications — is requested separately, in clear and simple language, distinct from any other information, and is never bundled with other terms.

You may withdraw your consent at any time by contacting our Privacy Officer, subject to legal or contractual restrictions and reasonable notice. Withdrawal does not affect the lawfulness of processing carried out before the withdrawal. If you withdraw consent, we may no longer be able to respond to your request or provide certain services.

Where consent is required from a minor under 14 years of age, it must be given by the person having parental authority or by the tutor.

We send commercial electronic messages (such as promotional emails or text messages) only where we have your express or implied consent under Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation. Every commercial message we send identifies us, provides our contact information and includes a functioning unsubscribe mechanism.

You may unsubscribe at any time using the link in the message or by contacting our Privacy Officer. We will give effect to your request without delay and in any event within 10 business days. We may still send you non-commercial messages that are necessary to respond to your inquiry or to complete a transaction you initiated.

The Website may use strictly necessary cookies and similar technologies that are required for the operation, security and basic functionality of the Website. Where consent is legally required for a cookie or similar technology, we will obtain consent before activating it.

At this time we do not use advertising cookies, marketing pixels, cross-site tracking, behavioural profiling technologies or third-party analytics that track visitors across websites.

Most browsers allow you to refuse or delete cookies through their settings. Blocking strictly necessary cookies may prevent parts of the Website from working correctly.

If we introduce non-essential cookies, analytics, advertising technology or any technology that allows a person to be identified, located or profiled, we will deactivate those functions by default, inform you clearly and obtain your consent where the law requires it, and we will update this Privacy Policy accordingly.

We may use third-party service providers to support the operation, security and maintenance of the Website and our business. These providers may include website hosting and content delivery services, vehicle inventory management systems, email and telecommunications providers, and IT and security service providers.

Where personal information is shared with a service provider, we limit such access to what is reasonably necessary for the relevant service or business purpose. Service providers may process personal information in accordance with their applicable terms, privacy practices and contractual or other obligations.

The Website may contain links to third-party websites, mapping services, social media platforms or other external services. These third parties operate independently from us, and we are not responsible for their content, security or privacy practices. We encourage you to review the privacy policies and terms of any third-party service you choose to use.

We do not sell, rent or trade personal information, and we do not disclose it to third parties for their own marketing purposes.

We may disclose personal information:

• To service providers acting on our behalf, under written mandate, as described above;
• With your consent, or at your request (for example to a lender, insurer or registry in connection with a transaction you initiate);
• To our professional advisors, such as lawyers, accountants and auditors, bound by professional confidentiality;
• Where required or permitted by applicable law, regulation, subpoena, court order or lawful request by a public authority;
• Where necessary to prevent or detect fraud, to protect our rights, property, security or safety, or those of our customers or others; and
• In connection with a commercial transaction such as a merger, acquisition, financing, reorganization or sale of all or part of our business, subject to a confidentiality agreement and to the conditions set out in Québec law.

If a commercial transaction is completed, we will notify affected individuals where required by law that their personal information has been transferred.

Some of our service providers, including hosting and cloud infrastructure providers, may store or process personal information outside Québec, including elsewhere in Canada, in the United States or in other jurisdictions.

Personal information stored in a foreign jurisdiction may be subject to the laws of that jurisdiction and accessible to its courts, law-enforcement and regulatory authorities. You may contact our Privacy Officer to learn where your personal information is stored.

We retain personal information only for as long as reasonably necessary to fulfil the purposes for which it was collected, to respond to inquiries or requests, to comply with applicable legal, regulatory, tax, consumer-protection or other record-keeping requirements, or to establish, exercise or defend legal claims.

Because the Website does not require user accounts or registration, we generally do not maintain personal information associated with user profiles. Where personal information is voluntarily provided to us, we retain it only for the period reasonably necessary for the applicable purpose or as otherwise required or permitted by law.

When personal information is no longer required for these purposes and no legal or legitimate business reason requires its retention, we securely destroy it or anonymize it in accordance with applicable law and our information-management practices.

We apply administrative, technical and physical safeguards that are reasonable in light of the sensitivity of the information, including:

• Encryption of Website traffic using HTTPS/TLS;
• Access to personal information limited to personnel who need it to perform their duties;
• Password protection, access controls and monitoring for the systems that hold inquiry records;
• Written agreements imposing security obligations on our service providers; and
• Secure destruction procedures for records that have reached the end of their retention period.

No method of transmission over the Internet or of electronic storage is completely secure. While we take reasonable measures, we cannot guarantee absolute security. Information you send us by ordinary email is not encrypted end to end and should not include sensitive information.

A confidentiality incident is any unauthorized access to, use or communication of personal information, any loss of personal information, or any other breach of its protection.

If a confidentiality incident occurs, we will take reasonable measures to reduce the risk of injury and to prevent new incidents of the same nature. Where the incident presents a risk of serious injury, we will promptly notify the Commission d’accès à l’information du Québec and the individuals concerned, and, where applicable, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada. We maintain a register of confidentiality incidents, which is made available to the Commission on request.

Subject to applicable law, you have the following rights with respect to the personal information we hold about you:

• Right of access: to be informed of the existence of and to obtain a copy of the personal information we hold about you, in a structured and commonly used technological format where it was collected electronically (data portability);
• Right of rectification: to have inaccurate, incomplete or ambiguous information corrected or deleted where it was collected unlawfully;
• Right to withdraw consent: to withdraw consent to the use or communication of your personal information, subject to legal and contractual restrictions;
• Right to de-indexing (right to be forgotten): to require that we cease disseminating your personal information or that a hyperlink giving access to it be de-indexed, under the conditions provided by law;
• Right to information about automated processing: to be informed if a decision about you is based exclusively on automated processing, and to submit observations (we do not currently use such processing); and
• Right to file a complaint with our Privacy Officer or with the Commission d’accès à l’information du Québec.

To exercise a right, send a written request to our Privacy Officer using the contact information below. We may ask you to verify your identity before responding, in order to protect your information from unauthorized disclosure. We will respond in writing within 30 days of receiving your request, at no charge, except for reasonable transcription, reproduction or transmission fees, of which we will inform you in advance.

If we refuse a request in whole or in part, we will explain the reasons, indicate the provision of the law on which the refusal is based, inform you of your recourses and of the applicable time limit, and assist you in understanding the refusal.

A French version of this Privacy Policy is available on our Website. If there is any discrepancy between the English and French versions, the French version prevails in Québec.

This Privacy Policy is governed by the laws of the Province of Québec and the federal laws of Canada applicable therein. Any dispute relating to it falls under the exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of the judicial district of Montréal, Québec.

We may update this Privacy Policy to reflect changes to our Website, our services, our business practices, the technology we use, or applicable legal requirements.

Examples of changes that would require an update include the introduction of:

• User accounts, registration or customer portals;
• Online purchasing, deposits or reservations;
• Financing, leasing or credit applications;
• Newsletters or promotional communications;
• Analytics, advertising or tracking technologies;
• Live chat, chatbots or call recording; or
• Any other feature involving the collection, use or communication of personal information.

The updated Policy takes effect when it is posted, and the “Last Updated” date above is revised. Where a change is material, we will provide a more prominent notice and, where the law requires it, obtain your consent. We encourage you to review this page periodically.