In This Issue:

- NEW FRANCHISE LEGISLATION IN CANADA:

British Columbia, which presently does not have a franchise specific statute, recently took one step closer to implementing such legislation when the British Columbia Law Institute (“BCLI”) recommended the passage of a franchise act in its recent report titled Report on a Franchise Act for British Columbia (March 2014) (the “Report”). This was a followup to the Consultation Paper on a Franchise Act for British Columbia (March 2013) (the “Consultation Paper”) and took into consideration the feedback generated by the Consultation Paper...

- HEADS UP: CANADA’S ANTI-SPAM LEGISLATION (CASL) TAKES EFFECT ON JULY 1ST:

Once CASL takes effect, you will need express or implied consent before you (or your franchisees) can send a commercial electronic message (CEM). While franchisors are well aware of the pending impact of CASL and have been diligently ensuring that their organizations are ready, the bigger question that looms on the horizon is what are they doing to help their franchisees understand and comply with CASL’s requirements. Franchisors will typically be able to rely on implied consent under the B2B CASL provisions to communicate electronically with their franchisees. The bigger concern will be the B2C communications between franchisees and consumers. There is a lot of information on CASL available and while seemingly straightforward, the actual implementation for both franchisors and franchisees may prove to be more difficult...

- UNITED STATES: THE “TOP TEN” THINGS FOR A SUPPLIER TO CONSIDER IN TERMINATING A DISTRIBUTOR:

Regardless of labels like “dealer,” “distributor” or “reseller,” there are some fundamental issues that demand attention whenever a supply relationship is involuntarily terminated. Dickinson Wright works with suppliers in planning and implementing decisions to terminate. We also successfully defend these decisions through negotiation, litigation or alternative dispute resolution. We have litigated termination disputes under various state and federal laws and have appeared in state and federal courts and before arbitration panels throughout the United States to successfully defend termination decisions...