Websites for Quebec businesses: French first, Law 25 explained

01Language: what the Charter asks of a website

The Charter's website duty is about availability. The French version has to exist, and English or another language can sit alongside it. We build that as French pages with their own URLs, French navigation, forms and error messages, and a French privacy policy, not a translated homepage with English everywhere else. The OQLF is the body to ask about a specific situation.

How far the Charter reaches a business based outside Quebec that sells into the province is not settled, and a Quebec lawyer should confirm your position. Contracts and invoices have their own rules: standard-form contracts go to the customer in French first, and invoices, receipts and order forms must be available in French, with bilingual versions allowed. This is general information, not legal advice.

Some Charter rules reach your business but not your website: product inscriptions, public signs on which French must be clearly predominant, and the tighter trademark rules in force since June 1, 2025. Your advisor handles those. The website's job is a complete French version that a French-speaking customer can use from the first page to the confirmation email.

02Law 25: what the site has to show

Law 25 modernized Quebec's private-sector privacy law in three phases between September 2022 and September 2024. On a website, the visible parts are the title and contact details of the person in charge of protecting personal information (by default, whoever has the highest authority in the business), a privacy policy in clear and simple terms, and a short notice at each form that says why the information is collected and who receives it.

Two build choices follow. Tracking that can identify, locate or profile a visitor stays off until the visitor turns it on, and forms give a notice rather than forcing an 'I agree to the privacy policy' checkbox. If personal information leaves Quebec, for example to hosting in the United States or to our engineering team in India, Law 25 expects a privacy impact assessment first and written agreements with the recipients; that assessment is yours and your advisor's, and we tell you which providers your site uses.

Law 25 also gives people rights your privacy policy should explain in plain terms: access, correction, withdrawal of consent, portability of the information they provided (since September 22, 2024) and, in some cases, de-indexation. Requests are answered within 30 days. If you ever make a decision about someone based only on automated processing, you have to tell them.

03Which Redenn products fit Quebec businesses

For a Quebec business the package math includes the second language. Each French page is priced as an additional standard page (CA$49/page) plus content insertion (CA$29/page) of the French text you or your translator supply. A Business site (CA$499, five pages) with a French version is therefore Business plus five French pages at those two rates. The same arithmetic applies on top of the Growth System (from CA$1,299) when chat and CRM are wanted.

Restaurants, salons and clinics fit Starter (CA$299) or Business Plus (CA$799) with booking. Manufacturers and accountants tend toward Business Plus with a bilingual blog, where each post is supplied in both languages.

Prices are in Canadian dollars and exclude taxes. Any tax that applies is shown separately on your invoice.

04Local search in Quebec

Quebec search happens in two languages. A bilingual site should present French pages to French searches and English pages to English ones, with correct hreflang tags, not a language switcher that hides half the content from crawlers. Your Google Business Profile should carry the French business name and description you actually use.

Local Search Foundation sets up the profile and the local structured data; the hreflang pairs are part of the bilingual build. We do not promise rankings in either language.

05How working with Redenn works in Quebec

We have no Quebec office. Brampton and most of Quebec share Eastern time, so our phone hours are your hours too, and Montreal, Quebec City, Laval, Sherbrooke and Gatineau are served the same way.

• Who you contract with: Redenn Informatics Inc., a federal corporation under the Canada Business Corporations Act, corporation number 1386773-1.
• Who leads your project: our founder, Narinder Chahal, based in Brampton, working with you by phone, video call and email.
• Who builds it: our own engineering team in Patiala, India, at Redenn Informatics Pvt. Ltd. Work moves forward overnight and replies land in your morning.
• How to reach us: email hello@redenn.com or call 1 888 905 4003, Monday to Friday, 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Eastern. A person replies within four business hours, Monday to Friday, and a written, fixed-price proposal follows within two business days.
• Money: build packages are invoiced in Canadian dollars and paid 30% to start, 30% at a mid-project milestone and 40% at launch. Prices are in Canadian dollars and exclude taxes. Any tax that applies is shown separately on your invoice.
• Ownership: You own it all. Your domain is registered in your name from the start. Once the project is paid, the code and content we create are yours: at handover you get the code and every login, or we keep managing the accounts for you on a paid plan. If you ever move to another developer, you take everything with you.
• Language: project communication is in English. We build the bilingual site and place the French copy that you or your translator supply; we do not write or translate French copy. Quebec clients receive the quote, terms and invoice in French first, or bilingual.