Canada Consumer Product Safety Act: Preparing and Maintaining Documents

2011
ISBN: 978-1-100-53355-1
Cat. No.: H128-1/11-657
HC Pub.: 110130

Under the Canada Consumer Product Safety Act, anyone who manufactures, imports, advertises, sells or tests a consumer product must prepare and maintain certain documents. The intent of these requirements is to ensure that consumer products are able to be traced throughout the supply chain at all times for the purposes of timely mandatory incident reporting, effective product recalls and routine inspections.

Requirements for retailers

Retailers are required to prepare and maintain documents that indicate the name and address of the person from whom they obtained the product, the location where they sold the product and the period during which they sold the product.

Requirements for all other suppliers

Anyone else who manufactures, imports into Canada, advertises, sells or tests a consumer product must prepare and maintain documents that indicate the name and address of the person from whom they obtained the product or the person to whom they sold it, or both if applicable.

Other requirements for record keeping

These requirements for record keeping are in addition to any other document retention requirements under the regulations. For example, the Consumer Chemicals and Containers Regulations, 2001 currently require manufacturers and importers to keep records describing tests carried out on the product and the results of such tests.

Timing

All required documents must be kept for at least six years after the year to which they relate unless regulations specify another time period.

Location

The required documents must be kept in a person's place of business in Canada unless regulations specify another location. The Minister of Health (Health Canada) may exempt a person from the requirement to keep documents in Canada if Health Canada considers it unnecessary or impractical for the person to do so. In those cases, Health Canada may impose terms and conditions in relation to that exemption.

Providing the required documents to Health Canada

Anyone who is required under the Canada Consumer Product Safety Act to prepare and maintain documents must provide the documents to Health Canada upon written request.

Exemptions

Health Canada is considering regulatory proposals to exempt classes of persons, such as those who obtain consumer products through donations, from the requirement to prepare and maintain records.

This document is a summary provided for convenient reference but should not be interpreted as Health Canada policy or a substitute for legislation. In case of any discrepancy between this document and legislation discussed here, the legislation shall prevail.

For more detailed information, please see the text of the Act and regulations under the Canada Consumer Product Safety Act or contact a product safety officer in your region by visiting www.healthcanada.gc.ca/productsafety or calling 1-866-662-0666.

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