PWGSC Twitter Terms of Use

Public Works and Government Services Canada's (PWGSC's) mandate is to be a common service agency for the Government of Canada's various departments, agencies and boards. With a strong focus on quality services and sound financial stewardship, we ensure optimum value by enabling other government departments and agencies to provide their programs and services to Canadians.

PWGSC’s Twitter accounts are a great way to interact with the department and learn about everything from government procurement and payroll and pension administration to greening government operations and more. We look forward to sharing information with you beyond the usual government web experience, but always encourage visits to our website for more detailed information.

The use of Twitter by PWGSC is intended to encourage interaction between the user of this platform and PWGSC, and in no way verifies or confirms either the accuracy of user comments or their compliance with the guidelines outlined here. PWGSC does not endorse any of the views in comments posted by users. Comments in violation of these Terms of Use may result in PWGSC blocking the user in question to prevent further inappropriate tweets.

Content

The PWGSC Twitter accounts (PWGSC_TPSGC and TPSGC_PWGSC) are mainly used as an alternative method for accessing the material posted on PWGSC's Web site. If you are looking for more information about the Department, information is available on the PWGSC's Web site.

Links to Other Web sites

From time to time the PWGSC Twitter account may tweet links to Web sites that are not under the control of PWGSC or the Government of Canada. These links are provided solely for the convenience of the users. The Government of Canada is not responsible for the accuracy, currency or reliability of the content. The Government of Canada does not offer any guarantee in that regard and is not responsible for the information found through these links, nor does it endorse the sites and their content.

Availability

We aim to update and monitor our Twitter account during regular office hours (9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Eastern Time) Monday to Friday, with limited monitoring on weekends. Any activity during holidays, after core hours and on weekends would likely be along the lines of emergency or urgent communications of significant value to our followers. Otherwise, the accounts will be relatively inactive during these times.

Third-party Twitter services may occasionally be unavailable, and we apologize in advance for any inconvenience.

Following and Unfollowing

At this time, PWGSC will only follow other Government of Canada institutions and organizations which we believe are relevant to the mandate of our work. This could include following the Twitter accounts of non-profit organizations, associations and other governmental agencies.

We will only take steps to block subscribers if they do not abide by these Terms of Use. Users may also be reported to Twitter if they do not comply to the service provider's terms of use.

The appearance of a Twitter user as a follower of the PWGSC account does not imply endorsement, nor does PWGSC following any particular user.

Retweets

PWGSC may retweet relevant material posted by other Government of Canada Twitter accounts and/or other accounts determined to be relevant to our followers and of significant value. This may include cross-linking, research findings, statistics, relevant events and conferences.

Direct Messages and @replies

Feedback and interaction is highly encouraged. All @replies and direct messages, as well as email sent to the Twitter account will be read, and any emerging themes or helpful suggestions will be passed to the relevant people in the department. Although we are not able to reply individually to all messages, they will be handled on a case-by-case basis and responded to when deemed appropriate.

If we feel a comment or a question posed to PWGSC is of significant business value and/or requires a greater level of detail, we may develop a formal response and distribute the information through other channels such as our Web site or other social media channels. We will pay attention to emerging themes and helpful suggestions and look forward to this potential interaction.

Reporters are asked to send questions to the appropriate contact in Media Relations and to refrain from submitting questions on Twitter.

PWGSC cannot engage in issues of party politics or answer questions that break the rules of our Guidelines for User Submissions in Social Media Tools.

Accessibility

Twitter, as a third party service provider, is not bound by Government of Canada policies for web accessibility.

Copyright

Information posted by PWGSC is subject to the Copyright Act of Canada. For more information, see the Important Notices page on the PWGSC Web site.

Official Languages

PWGSC respects the Official Languages Act and is committed to ensuring that information products are available in both French and English, of equal quality. PWGSC's tweets are available in both official languages. Simply view the appropriate PWGSC Twitter account: in English on PWGSC_TPSGC, and in French on TPSGC_PWGSC.

Through the very nature of the social media forum, content may vary between the English and French Twitter accounts, particularly where messages and comments are concerned. Any tweets or retweets that originate from PWGSC will be made available in both official languages when it concerns both English and French communities. Responses to direct messages and @replies will be made in the official language of origin.

Users should be aware that some links may direct users to sites of organizations or other entities that are not subject to the Official Languages Act and that these sources are only available in the language in which they are written.

Twitter.com is available in multiple languages including English and French. To change this user preference, go into your account settings and adjust accordingly.

Privacy

PWGSC's Twitter accounts are not Government of Canada Web sites and represent our presence on Twitter, a third-party service provider. Users are encouraged to read Twitter's privacy policy.

Information shared with PWGSC on Twitter is subject to the provisions of the Access to Information Act and the Privacy Act, which means that the information you share with PWGSC’s Twitter account may be captured, stored, accessed and disclosed in response to a request under either of these acts.

The personal information provided by you to PWGSC’s social media accounts is collected under the authority of the Financial Administration Act (FAA), in accordance with the Communications Policy of the Government of Canada. This information is being collected to capture conversations between you and PWGSC via the Department’s social media accounts. “Conversations” include questions and answers, comments, “likes”, retweets and other interactions where you provide feedback on content that the Department has posted, or when the Department provides you with information based on content that you post. The personal information collected is described in Personal Information Bank entitled Public Communications. Under the provisions of the Privacy Act, individuals have the right of access to, correction of and protection of their personal information. Instructions for obtaining your personal information are provided in Info Source, a copy of which is available in major public and academic libraries or online.

To protect your own privacy and the privacy of others, PWGSC recommends that you do not include personal information in your comments or other content you post. Personal information includes home addresses and telephone numbers, photographs containing images of identifiable individuals, and any other information consisting of personal information as defined in paragraph 3 of the Privacy Act. Should you have any questions about your privacy rights as explained in these Terms of Use, please contact the departmental Access to Information and Privacy (ATIP) Directorate.

Additional Information

If you are looking for more information about the Department, please consult our Web site.

The usual ways of contacting us for official correspondence are detailed in the Contact Us section of our Web site.

If you have questions about this policy, please contact SocialMedia-MediasSociaux@tpsgc-pwgsc.gc.ca.

Contact information

PWGSC's Twitter accounts (PWGSC_TPSGC and TPSGC_PWGSC) are managed by the Department’s Corporate Communications team, located at:

11 Laurier Street, Portage III
Gatineau, Quebec
Canada
K1A 0S5
Email: SocialMedia-MediasSociaux@tpsgc-pwgsc.gc.ca

For further contact details, please see the Contact Us page on PWGSC’s Web site.

For media enquiries

Media representatives can contact PWGSC’s Media Relations team during regular working hours.

Thank you for taking the time to read our Twitter Terms of Use. We encourage your participation in our discussion and look forward to an active exchange of ideas.