Twitter Terms of Use

The Office of the Taxpayers’ Ombudsman (OTO) uses Twitter—a third party social media micro blogging platform—as another way to inform and educate stakeholders.

The use of social media by the OTO is solely for the purpose of providing useful information to stakeholders. The information you provide on social media is not used for statistical or analytical purposes. The OTO does not employ social media as another method for receiving service-related complaints, nor does it consider social media as a forum for providing advice or recommendations.

The OTO’s Twitter account is available in English @OTO_Canada and in French @BOC_Canada.

Table of contents

• Content of tweets
• Time and frequency of tweets
• Following
• Followers
• Retweets
• @Replies and Direct Messages
• Media requests
• Official languages
• Accessibility
• Privacy
• Links to other websites
• Additional information

Content of tweets

The OTO will tweet about the following:

• outreach events;
• report releases; and
• useful information about OTO policies and procedures.

On occasion, the OTO may tweet about the following:

• Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) announcements relevant to the mandate of the Taxpayers’ Ombudsman;
• media coverage related to mandate of the Taxpayers’ Ombudsman; and
• media coverage about the OTO.

Time and frequency of tweets

The OTO intends to update and monitor the Twitter account between 7:00 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, Monday to Friday, except on statutory holidays.

The OTO intends to tweet two to three times per week (there may be some weeks where the OTO will have fewer tweets, for example weeks with statutory holidays).

Twitter may occasionally be unresponsive or unavailable. This is not the responsibility of the OTO and is, therefore, considered an exception to the specified time and frequency.

Following

The OTO may follow other users such as associations, organizations, or provincial or federal government departments whose work is relevant to its mandate. The OTO may also follow provincial ombudsman, federal ombudsman, and international counterparts. Following these Twitter accounts does not imply endorsement.

Followers

The appearance of a Twitter user as a follower of the OTO’s Twitter account does not imply endorsement.

Followers must abide by terms of service.

In addition, the OTO will block a follower if that follower tweets material that reflects or includes the following:

• material that is contrary to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms;
• racist, hateful, sexist, homophobic, slanderous, insulting, or life-threatening messages;
• serious, not proven, not supported, or not accurate accusations against individuals or organizations;
• abusive, aggressive, coarse, vulgar, violent, obscene, or pornographic comments;
• messages that encourage or suggest illegal activity;
• messages that infringe copyright or other intellectual property rights;
• solicitations, advertisements, or endorsements of any financial, commercial, or non-governmental agency. Similarly, we do not allow attempts to defame or defraud any financial, commercial, or non-governmental agency;
• announcements from labour or political organizations;
• messages written in a language other than English or French;
• comments not sent by the author and/or posted by anonymous or robot accounts;
• unintelligible or irrelevant messages; and
• messages that infringe upon an individual's privacy.

Retweets

The OTO may retweet a tweet that is relevant to the mandate of the Taxpayers’ Ombudsman if we feel it may be of use or interest to its followers. A retweet does not imply endorsement.

A retweet will be made in the official language of the content it links to. If the content is only available in English, the retweet will only be made to the English Twitter feed. If the content is only available in French, the retweet will only be made to the French Twitter feed. If the content is available in both official languages, the OTO will retweet in the language used by the user and prepare a tweet for the other official language Twitter feed to direct its followers to the content.

A follower may retweet a tweet posted by the OTO provided that the content is not changed and proper credit is given.

@Replies and Direct Messages

The OTO will read all @Replies and Direct Messages. Although the OTO will not be able to respond to all @Replies or Direct Messages, it will respond in cases where it has the ability to direct the follower to information they require or that may further assist them. The response will be provided in the original language of the @Reply or Direct Message.

The OTO Twitter account is not to be used to submit complaints. Followers who wish to submit a service-related complaint must do so in the manner set out in the Submit a complaint section of this website.

Media requests

All media questions should be directed to the OTO’s media relations contact.

Official languages

The OTO respects the Government of Canada’s Official Languages Act and the Treasury Board Secretariat’s Policy on the Use of Official Languages for Communications with and Services to the Public.

The OTO is committed to tweeting in both official languages simultaneously. The OTO Twitter account has a separate English feed (@OTO_Canada) and a separate French feed (@BOC_Canada). The OTO strives to ensure that the material found in these feeds is equivalent.

Please note that, in the following instances, bilingual content may not be provided:

• a link in a tweet or retweet to external content not subject to the Official Languages Act
• a response to an @Reply or Direct Message, as highlighted in the @Replies and Direct Messages section of these terms of use.

Accessibility

Twitter is a third party platform and is, therefore, not subject to the Government of Canada policies for Web accessibility.

Accessible content is available on this website.

Privacy

The OTO abides by the Government of Canada’s Privacy Act and section 241 of the Income Tax Act. The OTO does not request personal or confidential information through Twitter.

The OTO’s Twitter feeds—@OTO_Canada and @BOC_Canada—are hosted by Twitter. They are not governed by the Government of Canada. It is recommended that you refer to Twitter’s Privacy Policy.

Those who participate in Twitter do so at their own risk. The OTO cannot guarantee that users will respect the Privacy Act or Twitter’s Privacy Policy, and therefore, cannot be held accountable should personal information be tweeted by users. The OTO will, however, block or remove a follower who tweets personal information about themselves or another individual, as highlighted in the Followers section of these terms of use.

The OTO asks its followers to take caution when using Twitter. To protect your privacy and the privacy of others, avoid tweeting any personal details, including but not limited to:

• Social Insurance Number (SIN);
• telephone number;
• email address;
• home address;
• passwords;
• personal tax information; or
• other personal identifiers.

Links to other websites

A link to another website in a tweet or retweet by the OTO does not imply endorsement. A link is provided solely for the convenience and information of followers. The OTO is not responsible for the accuracy or the reliability of the content.

For more information, read the Hyperlinking Policy found in the Important notices section of this Web site.

Additional information

If you have questions or comments about these terms of use, please send them to the OTO using the Submit comments fillable form.