Volkswagen Canada reserves the right to change this policy at any time. The current policy will always be posted on this site.
Please note that if you have provided your consent to receive the Volkswagen newsletter and to be contacted by Volkswagen Canada with other emails and communications (marketing and advertising purposes), whether before or after the date that this policy was last updated, your profile information (including contact information, preferences and purchase history) may now be used by Volkswagen Canada to serve targeted content and interest-based (behavioural) advertising to you on the internet. Please see section 9., Advertising and Behavioral Targeting, for more details. If you have any concerns or questions, please contact us at vwcarecanada@vw.ca. You may withdraw your consent at any time by contacting vwcarecanada@vw.ca. Every successful relationship begins with communication. And since we've got a relationship right here on the Internet, let's communicate. Down below is everything you've ever wanted to know about our PRIVACY POLICY.
Should you have other questions or concerns about this Privacy Policy, please email us at: vwcarecanada@vw.ca.
Your privacy is important to us. To better protect your privacy we provide this Privacy Policy, which explains our information practices and the choices you can make about the way your information is collected and used. To make this Privacy Policy easy to find, we make it available on our homepage and at every point where personally identifiable data may be requested on vw.ca.
This Privacy Policy applies to all information collected by Volkswagen Canada.
We may collect your personal information at different times, including on this website, at special events, through customer surveys, and through our Customer Relations department.
The types of personal information collected may include:
• Name
• Address
• E-mail address
• Mailing address
• Phone number
• Purchase preferences
When you: (i) purchase your vehicle from an authorized dealer; or (ii) finance your purchase or lease a vehicle through VW Credit Canada, Inc. d/b/a Volkswagen Finance (“Volkswagen Finance”), we will collect information from the dealer and/or Volkswagen Finance regarding your purchase for our owner database, including for warranty and product campaign –updating purposes and to include you in customer service surveys. Your purchase, finance and lease transactions will be subject to additional terms regarding your personal information provided in connection with such transactions, and its use by us, Volkswagen Finance and our dealers.
We use the personal information you provide for the purposes that we identify when we ask you to provide the information (except as otherwise noted), including the following:
a) To respond to requests for products, information or services;
b) To better understand your preferences and needs and to improve our products and services;
c) To administer your vehicle warranty, purchase, lease or financing;
d) For market research purposes;
e) To provide you with information about your vehicle (including product campaigns); and
f) To include you in advertising and marketing campaigns, including serving targeted content and interest-based ads.
We may use non-identifying and aggregate information derived from your personal information to better understand our customers’ purchase and product/service preferences, through statistical analyses and studies.
Personal information may be collected, used, or disclosed without the knowledge or consent of the individual in certain circumstances, as permitted or required by law. These circumstances include personal information which is subject to solicitor-client privilege or is publicly available, where collection or use is clearly in the interests of the individual and consent cannot be obtained in a timely way, to investigate a breach of an agreement or a contravention of a law, to act in response to an emergency that threatens the life, health or security of an individual, for debt collection, or to comply with a subpoena, warrant or court order.
When your personal information is no longer required to fulfill the purpose for which it was collected, it will be destroyed, erased, or made anonymous, provided there are no legal requirements for its continued retention. Our systematic practices for information and records retention and destruction apply to personal information.
For the purposes outlined above, we may share your personal information with Volkswagen Finance and with our authorized dealers. Unless you request us not to do so, you agree that we may use and disclose your personal information to Volkswagen Finance and our authorized dealers for the purposes of selectively including you in advertising and marketing campaigns related to Volkswagen Canada, Volkswagen Finance or our authorized dealers and their products and services. If you would prefer that we not use your personal information for such advertising or marketing campaigns, please contact us in any of the ways described below under the heading “How to Contact Us”.
Your personal information may be transferred to third party service providers that we use to assist in managing and processing your personal information for the purposes identified above. Our third party service providers are required to use, maintain and disclose your personal information only in accordance with our instructions to them and only on our behalf.
When you purchase a vehicle equipped with a trial subscription to SiriusXM Satellite Radio, we will share your personal information with Sirius XM Canada Inc. in order to complete the service activation.
We will never sell your personal information to any other company, or disclose it to any other entities, except with either, your prior consent, or as may be required or permitted by law.
Your personal information may be stored on servers located outside of Canada (including the United States) or transferred outside of Canada for processing. Please note that the privacy laws in such jurisdictions differ from Canadian privacy laws and are subject to disclosure pursuant to the laws of those countries, and in some jurisdictions your personal information may be accessed by law enforcement authorities or the courts.
We will only send email, text or other electronic messages to you if you have an existing vehicle warranty, other extended coverage or some other form of existing business relationship with us or have asked for or otherwise expressly agreed to receive emails, texts or other electronic messages from us. Any electronic message that you receive from us will identify us as the sender, enable you to contact us directly and provide for a means of unsubscribing from further electronic messages.
"Cookies" are small items of data that some websites either write to your hard drive upon your visit to their site(s) or store in the browser. These data files contain information the site can use to organize the pages you have visited on a particular website. Some of our websites may use "cookie" technology to measure site activity and save site preferences. In this way, we can deliver tailor-made information suiting your personal interests upon your next visit to our site(s). Our use of "cookie" technology is, thus, to provide you with a more individualized delivery of information and an optimal viewing experience.
Web pages, emails and mobile apps may contain a small transparent image file or line of code to record how you interact with them. They are often used in conjunction with web browser cookies (or the unique identifier of your mobile device) and they are used to help us to better analyze and improve our services. For example, these technologies may track which web pages you visit or which elements of a page you viewed, when and for how long, whether you viewed and/or clicked on an advertisement on a site or whether you opened or clicked on marketing emails sent to you. When corresponding with you via HTML capable email, we may use "format sensing" technology, which allows pixel tags to let us know whether you received and opened our e-mail.
We may use technology to serve advertisements on our own web sites and within its content as that content is served across the Internet. In addition, we may use third-party ad networks, publishers, social media platforms, and other entities to serve targeted content and interest-based (behavioural) advertisements to you based on your profile information (including, your contact information, preferences and purchase history). For instance, we may have Facebook or Instagram serve posts to you with information about Volkswagen vehicles that we think will be of interest to you, based on your profile information. We may also use third party analytics vendors to evaluate and provide us with information about the use of our web sites and viewing of our content.
Ad network providers, data providers, publishers and other media-related companies, and/or analytics service providers may set and access their own cookies, pixel tags and similar tracking technologies on your device’s web browser and they may otherwise collect or have access to information about you. We and they may target advertisements for products and services in which you might be interested based on your visits to both the Volkswagen web sites and other web sites. We and they may use a variety of companies to serve advertisements.
If you would prefer not to accept cookies, most browsers will allow you to: (i) change your browser settings to notify you when you receive a cookie, which lets you choose whether or not to accept it; (ii) disable existing cookies; or (iii) set your browser to automatically reject any cookies.
You may also opt-out of network advertising programs that track your activities across multiple websites to deliver personalized advertising content to you. Please visit Digital Advertising Alliance of Canada Opt-Out Page, NAI Opt-Out Page and the Ad Choices Opt-Out Page.
These websites provide tools that identify member companies that have cookies on your browser and provides mechanisms to opt-out of those cookies. You will still receive other types of advertising from participating companies; however, it will not be based on your interests. Deleting browser cookies can remove your opt-out preferences, so you should use these tools periodically to ensure that your preferences are up-to-date.
Because your privacy is important to us, we use additional technologies and measures to prevent unauthorized access or disclosure, maintain data accuracy, and ensure appropriate use of this information.
Personal information will be protected with safeguards appropriate to the sensitivity of the information. Our employees and contractors will be made aware of the importance of maintaining the confidentiality of personal information, and we will exercise care in the disposal or destruction of personal information to prevent unauthorized parties from gaining access to it. We will safeguard personal information by physical measures (for example, locked filing cabinets and restricted access to offices), organizational measures (for example, security clearances, continued employee training and limiting access on a "need-to-know" basis), and technological measures (for example, the use of passwords and encryption).
You have the choice of whether or not to give us your personal information. Your consent may be given expressly or implied, depending on the circumstances. Providing your personal information, whether in person, by telephone, or on-line, constitutes your consent to the collection, use and disclosure of such personal information by us in accordance with this Privacy Policy and with our statements provided to you at the time you provide information to us. The supply of products or services will not be conditional upon your consent to the collection, use, or disclosure of your personal information beyond that required to fulfill legitimate purposes.
At any time, subject to legal restrictions, you may withdraw, verify or change your consent to our use of your personal information, or request us to delete it from our files. For example, if you have previously consented to having your personal information used to include you in marketing campaigns, you may withdraw your consent from having your personal information used for this purpose. You may also stop the delivery of future advertising or marketing e-mails from us by clicking the unsubscribe link in the e-mail you receive. If you do not agree to our use of cookies or pixel tags at any time, you should set your browser settings accordingly. If you disable the cookies or pixel tags that we use, this may impact or prevent your user experience while on our websites.
We do not seek to obtain, nor do we wish to receive, personal information directly from minors; however, we cannot always determine the age of persons who access and use our websites. If a minor (as defined by applicable law) provides us with his or her data without parental or guardian consent, we encourage the parent or guardian to contact us to have this information removed and to unsubscribe the minor from future Volkswagen Canada marketing communications.
We are committed to ensuring that the personal information we hold for each individual is accurate, up-to-date and complete. You have the right to access your personal information in our files and to update or remove that information as necessary, subject to any legal or contractual restrictions and reasonable notice. To access your personal information, please contact us by e-mail or post at the numbers and address provided below. Please be sure to specify what information requires updating or removal. Please note that requests for access to your personal information may be refused to the extent permitted or required by law.
If you wish to change your consent to our use of your information, change your privacy preferences, or update your information, or if you have any questions or concerns about our Privacy Policy, please email us at vwcarecanada@vw.ca.
Or write to us at:
777 Bayly Street West
Ajax, ON, L1S 7G7
Attention: Privacy Officer