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URGENT INFORMATION FOR DEALER
PRINCIPAL
Dear Registrant:
Advertising Guidelines.
In recent months, OMVIC staff
have been receiving complaints
from dealers and consumers alike
concerning the quality and
nature of advertising in
newspapers across the province.
It is becoming increasingly
apparent that many dealers,
particularly new car dealers,
have decided to simply ignore
long-standing guidelines on
acceptable advertising
practices. These guidelines are
certainly not new and were
widely distributed to registered
dealers by the Registrar's
Office several years ago.
A copy of the guidelines is
attached to this report. I
strongly urge you, as well as
the appropriate staff within
your organization, to
familiarize yourselves with the
guidelines to ensure compliance
in all future advertisements.
Effective immediately, OMVIC
will actively monitor ads and
will no longer tolerate the
blatant abuses that have become
a regular feature of dealer
advertising. To that end, we are
seeking your cooperation:
Firstly, ensure that your ads
comply with the guidelines, and
secondly, if you become aware of
objectionable ads, please share
your concerns with us.
Recognizing that these
guidelines are now several years
old, OMVIC requested the Ontario
and Toronto Automobile Dealers
Associations to bring forward
their suggestions for updating
them.
I would also encourage you to
let us know your views on what
are acceptable advertising
guidelines. We intend to release
updated guidelines early in the
new year. Until that time,
however, you are once again
reminded that the current
guidelines remain in effect, and
will be strictly enforced.
Curbsider Hotline. Our last
report promised that OMVIC would
be installing a curbsider
hotline. Well, here it is:
1-888-NO CURBS
The line will be answered by a
dedicated staff member until we
have a chance to monitor the
volume of calls. Callers will be
asked to answer a number of
simple, straightforward
questions intended to assist our
investigators in their work. For
those of you who are "connected"
our anti-curbsider e-mail
address is
nocurbs@omvic.on.ca
As always, if you have any
comments or suggestions, please
feel free to contact me
directly.
Sincerely yours,
Carl Compton,
Registrar,
Motor Vehicle Dealers Act
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