Executive Summary: Key Legal and Evidentiary Issues

• A used-car dealer failed to disclose that a vehicle sold to a consumer had previously been seriously damaged and rebuilt.
   
• Sections 228 and 253 of the Consumer Protection Act create a presumption that a consumer would not have paid as high a price had a material omission been disclosed.
   
• Section 156 of the Consumer Protection Act requires a window sticker disclosing a vehicle's accident and repair history, and the dealer could not prove this sticker was provided.
   
• Credibility played a central role, since the plaintiff's account of the sale was accepted while her account of the vehicle's subsequent use and disposal was rejected due to contradicting odometer and registry evidence.
   
• Quantifying damages required the court to estimate a reasonable reduced price using the plaintiff's own resale listing as a benchmark, since no formal appraisal evidence was presented.
   
• Moral damages were awarded separately from the price reduction to compensate for stress and inconvenience caused by the dealer's concealment.
   

Facts of the case

Fatoumata Abdoulaye Diallo purchased a used 2013 Kia Forte from 9503-4360 Québec inc., doing business as Primocar. She was drawn to the vehicle through a Marketplace advertisement describing it as being in good condition, with no mention of any prior serious accident. On September 28, 2023, she signed the sale contract and paid a $3,000 deposit, after Primocar's representative told her a test drive was impossible because the vehicle required an SAAQ mechanical inspection first. She left that day without a copy of the contract or the sticker required by law, holding only an Interac receipt for her deposit.

On October 30, 2023, Diallo returned to pay the $3,247 balance and take possession of the car. Primocar's representative initially refused to let her review the SAAQ inspection documents until payment was confirmed. Once she paid, those documents revealed the vehicle had been certified as rebuilt after a serious accident. Diallo immediately demanded a refund and cancellation of the sale. The representative refused, ended the discussion by throwing the keys and paperwork onto a chair, and told her to go to court if she wanted her money back. The next day, after noticing steering, suspension, and noise problems, she sent a formal demand letter seeking cancellation, which Primocar ignored.

Policy and legislative provisions at issue

The case turned on several provisions of the Consumer Protection Act. Section 228 prohibits a merchant from omitting an important fact in its representations to a consumer. Section 253 creates a presumption that, where such an omission occurs, the consumer would not have contracted, or would not have paid as high a price, had the fact been known. Section 156 requires dealers to affix a window sticker disclosing a used vehicle's status and any repairs it has undergone, and section 272 sets out the remedies available to a consumer, including annulment of the contract, a reduction of their obligation, or damages. Article 1407 of the Civil Code of Québec mirrors this framework by allowing a party whose consent was vitiated to keep the contract in force while claiming a reduction equivalent to the damages they could otherwise claim.

Reasoning and analysis

The court found that Primocar's representative never gave Diallo the legally required sticker, since the contract he produced did not include it and only late-filed inspection reports were submitted. The court rejected the representative's testimony that Diallo had been told about the vehicle's accident history before the sale, finding the timeline of events, corroborated by her cousin's testimony, more credible. Her strong reaction upon receiving the SAAQ documents, acknowledged even by Primocar's own representative, further supported the conclusion that she had only just learned the vehicle's true history. The court therefore held that Primocar's silence on a material fact vitiated Diallo's consent through fraudulent conduct.

At the same time, the court found significant credibility problems with other parts of Diallo's claim. Her sworn testimony that the car sat unused after only 688 km of driving was contradicted by an odometer photo from her own Marketplace listing and by SAAQ registry records showing she had actually driven 7,087 km before disposing of the vehicle. Her claim that she gave the car away for free to a friend of her sister's, because it was worthless, was similarly undermined, particularly since she could not identify this person or call her as a witness, and since her own listing had advertised the car for $4,000 despite disclosing its damaged status. SAAQ records further showed the next owner drove the vehicle 7,073 km more before reselling it to a dealership. The court drew an adverse inference from Diallo's failure to call a material witness and disregarded her testimony on these points, while still finding that Primocar's concealment had vitiated her consent to the purchase.

Because Diallo had already resold the vehicle, rescission of the contract was not possible, so the court determined that a reduction of the purchase price, awarded as damages, was the appropriate remedy. In the absence of expert valuation evidence, the court used Diallo's own Marketplace listing, which had offered the disclosed damaged vehicle for $4,000, as a benchmark for what a reasonable buyer would have paid and a reasonable seller would have accepted had the truth been known at the time of sale.

Ruling and overall outcome

The court granted the claim in part in favour of Diallo. It set the reduction of the purchase price at $2,250, representing 36% of the price she paid, and awarded a further $500 in moral damages for the stress, inconvenience, and resale difficulties caused by Primocar's concealment of the vehicle's history. In total, Primocar was ordered to pay Diallo $2,750, with legal interest and the additional indemnity under article 1619 of the Civil Code of Québec running from November 4, 2023. Diallo was also awarded court costs of $207 in her favour.