Ontario towing regulations to come in January

By Jaykob Storey

BELLEVILLE — In January, the Ontario government plans to introduce new regulations on towing services to protect consumers.

The goal of these new regulations is to provide greater oversight for towing companies. Some of the changes include:

• All towing companies must accept credit cards.
• Comprehensive price lists are to be made available to customers.,
• Consumers must be informed if the towing company receives financial reward or incentive for providing a recommendation to a specific storage or repair shop.

Frankford resident, Tyler Frobel, posted an online review on Google about an experience he had with a local towing agency, “…it was very over priced and very shady. When it came time to pay I was told I needed to pay $125 down from $175; all for a job that took 4 minutes and required my car to be winched 4 feet out of a small patch of mud.”

Frobel’s experience is one shared by many people in Ontario. During a consultation with more than 500 Ontario consumers, the provincial government found that 84% felt that tow truck drivers and businesses should be required by law to provide prices to consumers in writing before the vehicle is towed.

QNet News spoke with Kim Reid, owner of McCaffrey’s Garage and Towing in Belleville. Her stance on the new regulations was mixed and she explained that in her view, “Different parts of the regulations are really good, and other parts are more of a nuisance and a hazard.”

One of the new laws she felt would be difficult to comply with was that tow truck businesses will be required to notify the owner of a vehicle within 15 days of towing or storing.

“It used to be 60 days. Which is fine, but in order to find that information, because it’s not always provided to us at the scene of an accident and we don’t always know who the owner is, we don’t know who the driver is, we have have to actually do lien searches on all of these vehicles now, to find out who has an interest in them. It costs money and time.”

Despite this, she still says that the regulations are an important step, because not all companies are as consumer friendly.

“I think in some areas it needed to be done, but that’s the thing, you can’t pass legislation in just some areas, it’s got to go province wide. There are definitely some companies in our business that are giving us a bad name. So this is set out to protect our consumers.”

While the regulations may not have a significant effect on her business, she did bring up concerns with the way these changes were being implemented.

“The Ontario government passed it, but didn’t assist in any ways to make it easier.”

The mystery pricing that Frobel took issue with is one of the most prominent new regulations. Until recently, many people were in the dark about how much they had paid for towing services, until the task was already completed. While a price list seems like a simple fix, Reid said that this may be as easy as one would imagine.

“I am now legally required to provide a price list to every customer, which is extremely difficult because every service requires different tools. So the price list needs to be in depth.”