Dual language store?

[egzatek]

Hello,

I just opened a store and might have a little problem.  Pretty sure the answer will be no, but will ask anyway just to have a back-up answer in case needed.

ebay.ca is dual language English / French.  Is there a way to make your e-bay store bilangual?  I tried looking on the net for it, but it seems that store have only 1 langauge and that's it.

Since we are a large Quebec company, we are bound by the OLFQ to respect French rules of posting and selling ect...  So the fact that we cannot offer our store in both languages might be a problem on our next audit. 

Also since our business from e-bay is roughly 95% Anglophone, I will stock with our store in english if that is the only option..

But if it is not possible it is not possible and OLFQ will have to live with it.

All answers are appreciated

Thank you

[pjcdn2005]

There is a French version of ebay Canada and an English version. You can use either one but there is no version that has the item details etc in both English and French. You could put both English and French in the description area.

I am not familiar with Quebec laws but I would think that their laws would be for businesses that have a brick and mortar store in Quebec. Are you sure they apply to an online store as well?

[reallynicestamps]

There is no problem with having bilingual stores.

Layout would be the only question in my mind.

You can add HTML coding to your listings -- I would suggest putting the two descriptions side by side.

On the eBaydotCAdotFR site, you get FREE SUBTITLE. This would be one way to have bilingual titles. But the sub-title is not searchable.

Fortunately pictures are multilingual.

[pierrelebel]

"But the sub-title is not searchable."

Actually the subtitles that come free on eBay.cafr are searchable.

Sous-titre (0,00 $C)

For example (from old ended listings):

http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_sacat=0&_nkw=pierre%20lebel&LH_Complete=1&rt=nc&_trksid=p2...

Those on eBay.com and eBay.ca are not..

[egzatek]

Thank you all for your answers, it clarifies things for me.

As we are a brick and mortar enterprise doing business in Quebec that law applies for us even if it is a virtual store because any companies with websites are bound by that law (probably why E-Bay had to make a FR site in the first place).

Thanks once again for your answers

I wish you all a very good 2016.

[recped]

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@lithoservice wrote:

Thank you all for your answers, it clarifies things for me.

As we are a brick and mortar enterprise doing business in Quebec that law applies for us even if it is a virtual store because any companies with websites are bound by that law (probably why E-Bay had to make a FR site in the first place).

Thanks once again for your answers

I wish you all a very good 2016.

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eBay has no "presence" in Quebec, they set up the French version of eBay.ca because someone in years gone past who actually had a brain in their heads thought that the 8 Million potential buyers was well worth the effort.

eBay Canada is not the only bilingual eBay site, eBay Belgium is also bilingual (French & Dutch) also not because of any regulation (Belgium has "language freedom" written into their constitution).

I'm not totally up on the Quebec Language Laws, don't the French and/or bilingual requirements apply only to a website owned and/or controlled by the Quebec based company? I don't see how they can apply to third-party websites especially ones that are not even located in Canada.

If that were true then no Quebec company could sell on ANY online marketplace that was not bilingual.

[pierrelebel]

http://globalnews.ca/news/1671128/oqlf-targets-english-retail-websites/

"Because the OQLF (Office Quebecois de la Langue Francaise) will only send a notice to a company to change their site after there’s been a complaint, there are many chains that have stores in Quebec and no French-language website, but are still running an English-only site."

[egzatek]

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@pierrelebel wrote:

http://globalnews.ca/news/1671128/oqlf-targets-english-retail-websites/

"Because the OQLF (Office Quebecois de la Langue Francaise) will only send a notice to a company to change their site after there’s been a complaint, there are many chains that have stores in Quebec and no French-language website, but are still running an English-only site."

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Thank you Pierre, 

True and not true at same time.  It is true for companies that do not participate in any government programs, those companies will be audited if there is a complaint made.  But law changed 4-5 years ago, that any company with over 50 employees, that want to participate or benefit from a provincial program MUST have their OQLF conformity certification, which is our case.  Having so far gone through 2 audits, they are pretty thorough about what they look for, and computers / websites / software is a major area they look at.

But I think we will cross that bridge to change things up on our e-bay store if and only if they force us to change it.  My argument to them will be that it is not available to be both french and english and since 95% of our business on e-bay is from english speaking people we need to choose english.

"Recped : I'm not totally up on the Quebec Language Laws, don't the French and/or bilingual requirements apply only to a website owned and/or controlled by the Quebec based company? I don't see how they can apply to third-party websites especially ones that are not even located in Canada."

Really doesn't matter if it is a 3rd party or not, large companies MUST offer software, websites and whatnot in both official languages to their employees, hell, according to the law I should not even use the english version of a website if a french version is available.....  Thing is the law is much more employee oriented than consummer oriented when it comes to large companies.

Thank you all for your answer, they have been very helpfull

Wish you all a great new year with lots of sales 🙂

[pocomocomputing]

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@lithoservice wrote:

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@pierrelebel wrote:

http://globalnews.ca/news/1671128/oqlf-targets-english-retail-websites/

"Because the OQLF (Office Quebecois de la Langue Francaise) will only send a notice to a company to change their site after there’s been a complaint, there are many chains that have stores in Quebec and no French-language website, but are still running an English-only site."

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Thank you Pierre, 

True and not true at same time.  It is true for companies that do not participate in any government programs, those companies will be audited if there is a complaint made.  But law changed 4-5 years ago, that any company with over 50 employees, that want to participate or benefit from a provincial program MUST have their OQLF conformity certification, which is our case.  Having so far gone through 2 audits, they are pretty thorough about what they look for, and computers / websites / software is a major area they look at.

But I think we will cross that bridge to change things up on our e-bay store if and only if they force us to change it.  My argument to them will be that it is not available to be both french and english and since 95% of our business on e-bay is from english speaking people we need to choose english.

"Recped : I'm not totally up on the Quebec Language Laws, don't the French and/or bilingual requirements apply only to a website owned and/or controlled by the Quebec based company? I don't see how they can apply to third-party websites especially ones that are not even located in Canada."

Really doesn't matter if it is a 3rd party or not, large companies MUST offer software, websites and whatnot in both official languages to their employees, hell, according to the law I should not even use the english version of a website if a french version is available.....  Thing is the law is much more employee oriented than consummer oriented when it comes to large companies.

Thank you all for your answer, they have been very helpfull

Wish you all a great new year with lots of sales 🙂

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If that statement is true, then using the eBay.ca French site will present all the ebay pages in French for My eBay for managing sales and service as well as the Sell Your Item listing tool. The content in the listing can still be in English or English French but for employees, the eBay site would be in French and that would seem to comply with the OQLF requirements from what you wrote about being worker orientated.

Are you using the eBay Canada English or French site?

For a while years ago, if you listed on eBay.ca Canada French site, the eBay categories and Item Specifics would remain in French when viewed on eBay.ca or eBay.com. But it appears that was fixed 2-3 years ago.

So I would think you should be using eBay.ca French site to meet the law requirements.