Email fail

After requesting information from the Ministry of Health in French and receiving answers in English twice, a Francophone journalist complained to our Office. He also reported that the email signatures of the government employees he contacted were in English only. We discovered that all media requests were going to the same email address and a receipt acknowledgment was generated in English if no bilingual agent was available to answer the email in French. After our intervention, the Ministry’s communications team implemented several corrective measures, including translating receipt acknowledgments and other standard messages, making email signatures bilingual, and creating a specific inbox for French-speaking media.

Learn more about the French Language Services Unit which answers questions and takes complaints about services in French.
Read about how we helped other people in our Selected cases.