Bill 29 made your Canadian repair story visible at the point of sale.
If you direct service, after-sales or compliance at an OEM, distributor or retailer selling electronics into Québec, the availability of parts and repair is now something you declare in writing before the sale and answer for on a 10-day clock after it.
Markham, Ontario depot · repairing electronics in Canada since 1994 · authorized service programs for Sony, Yamaha, Onkyo, Pioneer, Cambridge Audio, QSC, Rotel and Monitor Audio
What Bill 29 requires of an OEM or a retailer
Since 5 October 2025, anyone who makes or sells a good whose use may require a component to be replaced, cleaned or updated must keep replacement parts, repair services and the information needed to maintain or repair it available for a reasonable period after the sale, at a reasonable price. You can limit that only by telling the buyer in writing, before the sale, exactly what is not guaranteed. Manufacturers publish that statement online in French; merchants put it in front of the buyer before the contract is concluded.
Bill 29 is An Act to protect consumers from planned obsolescence and to promote the durability, repairability and maintenance of goods, assented to on 5 October 2023. It amends Québec's Consumer Protection Act (CQLR c. P-40.1) in phases. The prohibition on trading in goods whose obsolescence is planned, and on techniques that make maintenance or repair more difficult, applied from assent. The availability warranty and its disclosure rules came with a regulation adopted on 25 June 2025 and in force on 5 October 2025. The warranty of good working order lands on 5 October 2026.
Neither "reasonable period" nor "reasonable price" is defined by a number. The final regulation left both open, so the lines will be drawn case by case. The one working test available today comes from the Office de la protection du consommateur: a reasonable price is one that does not discourage a consumer from buying the part or the service. Two mechanics catch people out alongside it. Parts must be installable with commonly available tools and without causing irreversible damage, and information accessible online, through software or through an app must be free, so neither a factory-only part nor a paywalled service manual will do.
Then there is the clock. A consumer who asks for a repair is entitled to a written answer within 10 days stating the time frame. If the consumer refuses that time frame, the good can be repaired by someone else at the merchant's or the manufacturer's expense, and with no satisfactory reply at all the consumer can demand replacement or reimbursement.
The obligations, and when each one started
Bill 29 arrived in three waves, and the wave matters more than the headline. This table separates what has been enforceable since 2025 from what starts on 5 October 2026, with a source for every line.
| Who | Obligation | In force | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Manufacturers and merchants | Make replacement parts, repair services and the information needed to maintain or repair the good available for a reasonable period after the sale, at a reasonable price, for goods whose use may require a component to be replaced, cleaned or updated. | 5 Oct 2025 | OPC Osler |
| Manufacturers and merchants | Do not hinder repair. Parts must be installable with commonly available tools and without causing irreversible damage, and information accessible online, through software or through an app must be free of charge. | 5 Oct 2025 | OPC McCarthy |
| Manufacturers | Publish online, in French, prominently and in a form the consumer can easily save and print, whether availability is fully, partially or not at all guaranteed, identifying what is not guaranteed. Repeat it in any user or maintenance manual. | 5 Oct 2025 | OPC BLG |
| Merchants | Put the same information in front of the buyer in writing before the contract is concluded, or publish it online in a clear, printable form with a hyperlink to the manufacturer’s statement near your own. | 5 Oct 2025 | OPC McCarthy |
| Manufacturers and merchants | Answer a consumer’s repair request in writing within 10 days, stating the time frame for the repair. If the consumer refuses that time frame, the good may be repaired by someone else at your expense. With no satisfactory reply, the consumer can demand replacement or reimbursement. | 5 Oct 2025 | OPC Osler |
| Manufacturers and merchants | Statutory warranty of good working order on listed new goods, at no cost to the consumer: parts, labour and reasonable shipping. 6 years for ranges, refrigerators, freezers, air conditioners and heat pumps; 5 years for dishwashers, washers and dryers; 4 years for televisions; 3 years for computers, tablets, cellphones and consoles. | 5 Oct 2026 | Osler Stikeman Elliott |
| Merchants and manufacturers | Show the duration of that warranty of good working order before the purchase: merchants near the advertised price, prominently, and manufacturers online. | 5 Oct 2026 | Osler Stikeman Elliott |
| Everyone selling into Québec | No trading in goods whose obsolescence is planned, and no techniques designed to make maintenance or repair more difficult. | 5 Oct 2023 | Osler Bennett Jones |
| Enforcement | Monetary administrative penalties and penal fines reaching, for a company, 5% of worldwide turnover for the preceding fiscal year on the most serious violations, with a due-diligence presumption reaching directors and officers. | 5 Oct 2023 | Osler Bennett Jones |
This page is general information about the legislation, not legal advice. Confirm your obligations with counsel.
What it means operationally
The legislation is short. The work it creates is not, and almost none of it is legal work. Here is the workload, in the order it surfaces inside a service organization.
A disclosure inventory, per SKU
Every model sold into Québec needs one defensible answer: are parts, repair services and repair information fully, partially or not at all guaranteed, and if partially, which ones are not. Per SKU, kept current as models age out, and matching what the product page and the manual say.
Parts, stocked and priced
A part that exists in a global system but takes six weeks and a brokerage fee to land is a weak answer to a reasonable-time, reasonable-price test. Which parts you hold, where, at what price to a consumer or an independent repairer, and for how long.
Repair capacity and a turnaround you can state
The 10-day rule asks you to name a time frame in writing, and you cannot name one you do not have. Bench capacity, parts on hand and a measured turnaround are the difference between answering a repair request and conceding it.
Documentation in French
Repair information has to be available in French, and the availability statement published in French, prominently, in a form a consumer can save and print. A translation and publishing workload landing on manuals, service information and the disclosure itself.
A response process that runs on 10 days
Somebody has to receive a repair demand, find the unit, check parts, commit to a time frame and reply in writing, inside ten days, in the right language. A process with an owner and a queue, not an inbox somebody checks.
A duration to publish before October 2026
From 5 October 2026 listed goods carry a statutory warranty whose duration merchants must show near the price and manufacturers must publish online. Computers, tablets, cellphones, consoles and televisions are on that list, so the repair cost across those years sits with you.
How Microland helps
Everything below this line is a commercial claim, so read it that way. Microland is a Canadian electronics depot, and we sell the four things a Bill 29 availability statement assumes you have.
Canadian depot repair
In-warranty and out-of-warranty repair at our Markham, Ontario facility, serving all of Canada. Where most depots diagnose to the board and swap it, we repair the board itself at the component and BGA level, including reballing and microsoldering, which keeps a model serviceable after replacement boards stop being made.
Repair and warranty programsParts supply
Genuine parts held in country and shipped across Canada, parts programs for OEM and extended-warranty networks with inventory at the depot and orders through the portal or the API, and harvesting that turns your own return stream into tested, inventoried spares instead of scrap.
Parts programsRefurbishment
Returns receiving, triage, testing and screening, refurbishment, grading and repackaging, so a unit that comes back under a repair demand has somewhere to go other than the recycler. Recovered units and recovered parts both feed the availability answer you publish.
RefurbishmentThe portal and the API that back the claim
A disclosure is a claim about your operation, so it needs records. Microland runs on a fully custom, in-house-built platform: a transactional portal where you see and act on every unit, approving estimates and routing dispositions, plus a full REST API so the depot sits inside your own service systems.
How the program runsBring your Québec SKU list. We will tell you what a defensible availability statement costs to stand behind.
Request a consultationHow a program stands up
Six steps, in the order they happen. None of it needs capital from you, and none of it is quoted before we have seen your estate.
- STEP 01
Scope the estate and the statement
We start from your Québec SKU list and the statement you intend to publish, then work back to what has to be true operationally for each line of it. Coverage, exclusions and the models you are prepared to call partially guaranteed are agreed here, in writing.
- STEP 02
Set up parts
Sourcing, stocking levels and pricing for the parts the statement commits you to, held at the depot. Where parts are scarce or discontinued, harvesting from your returns and component-level board repair keep the commitment payable.
- STEP 03
Stand up the repair loop
Intake, diagnosis, repair, test and return in one in-country loop, with no border crossing in either direction. Average turnaround is five to seven business days for standard electronics repair, program volumes and parts availability permitting, and the commitment is defined per program when it is scoped.
- STEP 04
Wire it into your service desk
The portal goes live for your team and the REST API into your systems, so unit status, estimates, dispositions and turnaround are readable where your people already work. The development team extends both per partner rather than asking you to fit a stock workflow.
- STEP 05
Answer the clock
The answer you owe in ten days is a time frame, and the portal is where it comes from: the unit, the parts position and the queue in one view. Québec sites needing onsite attention are served in French through the national field network.
- STEP 06
Report, review, adjust
Per-unit history and program-level reporting through the portal or the API, so next year’s availability statement is written against what actually happened: failure patterns, parts consumption, turnaround, and the models getting expensive to keep serviceable.
The five things buyers push back on
These come up in every Bill 29 conversation we have. The answers are honest about what the law does not require, because an argument that overstates the law is worth nothing once your counsel reads it.
Our Québec volume is small
The obligation follows the sale, not the volume, and the disclosure is public either way. Small Québec numbers are the argument for a shared depot rather than your own: consolidating repair, parts and returns with one Canadian partner costs less than capacity you will use lightly. The same program covers the rest of Canada, which is usually where the volume actually is.
We already have a US depot
Bill 29 does not require your repair operation to be in Canada, and this page will not pretend otherwise. It requires availability within a reasonable time at a reasonable price, and a time frame you can put in writing within ten days. A cross-border loop adds border days, brokerage and duty to both legs of every consumer repair, which is exactly where those tests bite. Keeping the Canadian stream in country is a practical answer, not a legal one, and it can run alongside the US depot.
We are a retailer, not a manufacturer
Merchants carry their own obligations under the Act, not a diluted version of the manufacturer’s. You must put the availability information in front of the buyer in writing before the contract is concluded, or publish it with a hyperlink to the manufacturer’s statement nearby, and you sit alongside the manufacturer on repair demands and, from October 2026, on the warranty of good working order. In practice: collect disclosure data from every vendor you list, and have a repair answer for the ones who cannot.
What this costs
There is no capital in it. You buy bench time, parts holding and a reporting surface at program rates, against a repair and return cost you already carry somewhere. Component-level repair moves the arithmetic further than most buyers expect: a repaired board is a fraction of a replacement board and a harvested part a fraction of a new one, so models that look uneconomic under a swap-only vendor often stay economic here.
The French-language requirements
These are real and separate from the repair work: repair information must be available in French, and the availability statement published in French, prominently, in a printable form. Microland does not translate your manuals. What we cover is the service side: onsite work in Québec is performed in French through the national field network, so a store or site contact deals with a technician in the language they work in.
The depot behind the claim
A disclosure is only as good as the operation behind it, so here is the operation. No badges and no accreditation claims: we hold none, and we do not imply otherwise.
- One facility at 170 Alden Road, Unit 2, Markham, Ontario, serving all of Canada, so a Québec claim and a British Columbia claim run through the same bench and records.
- Authorized service centre for Sony, Yamaha, Onkyo, Pioneer and Cambridge Audio, authorized service provider for QSC and Q-SYS in Canada, and authorized service centre for Rotel, including the Michi series, and Monitor Audio. Eight OEM programs whose in-warranty work sets the standard the rest of the bench runs to.
- Component- and BGA-level board repair, including reballing and microsoldering, which keeps a model repairable once replacement boards are scarce, expensive or discontinued.
- Per-unit records by serial number: reported fault, diagnosis, work performed, parts used, test results and who did what, available through the portal or the API on demand.
- Parts held in country and shipped across Canada, plus harvesting that feeds serviceable components from your returns back into your own programs.
- Onsite field services coast to coast through a national partner network with Microland as prime contractor, Québec sites served in French.
Scope a Québec repair and parts program
Tell us what you sell into Québec and what your availability statement currently says, or does not. We will come back with what the parts, repair and reporting side would look like, and what it costs.
Bill 29 questions we get asked
Short answers first. Where a question turns on wording the regulation left open, we say so rather than inventing a number.
Does Bill 29 require parts or repair to be located in Canada?
No. The Act sets no location requirement. It requires that parts, repair services and repair information be available for a reasonable period at a reasonable price, in French, and that a repair request get a written time frame within ten days. In-country capability is a practical way to meet those tests, not a legal one.
What exactly has been in force since 5 October 2025?
The availability warranty and its disclosure rules. Manufacturers and merchants must keep parts, repair services and repair information available for a reasonable period at a reasonable price, publish whether availability is fully, partially or not at all guaranteed, and answer a repair request in writing within ten days with a time frame.
What changes on 5 October 2026?
The warranty of good working order starts. Listed new goods carry a statutory period during which the merchant and manufacturer bear repair costs, parts and labour: six years for ranges, refrigerators, freezers, air conditioners and heat pumps, five for dishwashers, washers and dryers, four for televisions, three for computers, tablets, cellphones and consoles.
How long is a reasonable period, and what is a reasonable price?
Neither is defined by number. The regulation left both open, so they will be settled case by case. The consumer regulator describes a reasonable price as one that does not discourage a consumer from buying the part or the service, which is the only working test available today.
Can we simply declare that parts and repair are not guaranteed?
You can limit the obligation that way, but only by telling the buyer in writing before the purchase, clearly and visibly, exactly what is not guaranteed. The declaration is also public, so it competes: a buyer comparing two products sees both answers side by side.
Does this apply to us if we are a retailer, not the manufacturer?
Yes. Merchants carry their own obligations. You must put the availability information in front of the buyer in writing before the contract is concluded, or publish it in a clear, printable form with a hyperlink to the manufacturer’s statement nearby, and you sit alongside the manufacturer on repair demands.
Do repair information and manuals have to be in French?
Yes. The information needed to maintain or repair the good must be available in French, and the availability statement published online in French, prominently, in a form a consumer can easily save and print. Where a user or maintenance manual exists, the statement must appear there too.
What happens if we miss the 10-day response?
The consumer gains remedies. If no time frame is given in writing within ten days, or the consumer refuses the one given, the good can be repaired by someone else at the merchant’s or manufacturer’s expense. With no satisfactory reply at all, the consumer can demand replacement or reimbursement.
What are the penalties for getting this wrong?
Bill 29 raised them substantially. The Act carries monetary administrative penalties and penal fines that, for a company, reach five per cent of worldwide turnover for the preceding fiscal year on the most serious violations, and it presumes directors and officers participated unless they exercised due diligence.
Québec is one province. Why does this affect our whole Canadian program?
Because product listings are national. Retailers do not maintain separate pages, manuals or specification sheets by province, so a disclosure decision made for Québec is usually the one every Canadian buyer sees, and the repair capability behind it ends up serving the whole country.
Sources
Every legal statement on this page traces to one of these. Primary sources first, then the law-firm commentary we checked the reading against.
- Office de la protection du consommateur, "Availability warranty and parts, services and information required for maintenance or repairs"
- National Assembly of Québec, Bill 29, An Act to protect consumers from planned obsolescence and to promote the durability, repairability and maintenance of goods
- Consumer Protection Act, CQLR c. P-40.1 (LégisQuébec)
- Osler, "From purchase to repair: how Bill 29 reshapes consumer rights in Québec"
- Osler, "The rules are set: get ready for the warranty of good working order, coming to Québec in October 2026"
- McCarthy Tétrault, "Quebec Releases Final Regulations on Repair and Replacement Obligations Under the Consumer Protection Act"
- BLG, "Québec’s new right-to-repair law adds to consumer protection"
- Stikeman Elliott, "The Warranty of Good Working Order for Consumer Goods in Québec: A Regulation Provides Clarity"
- Bennett Jones, "Québec Adopts New ‘Right to Repair’ and Obsolescence Law"
LAST REVIEWED: 21 September 2026
This page is general information about the legislation, not legal advice. Confirm your obligations with counsel.