Last reviewed: 14 September 2026

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Manitoba makes the seller answer for a warranty it didn't even write

Alberta, British Columbia, and Saskatchewan regulate an extended vehicle warranty as insurance. Ontario treats it as a future-performance-agreement consumer contract with its own disclosure and cancellation machinery. Manitoba's Consumer Protection Act takes a third approach entirely: instead of licensing the product or mandating a disclosure form, it puts legal responsibility for the warranty's performance directly on whoever sold it to you — regardless of who actually underwrites it.

The seller is on the hook, even as a middleman

Manitoba's Consumer Protection Act, C.C.S.M. c. C200, makes the seller of an extended warranty contract liable to the buyer for the performance of every obligation under that contract to service or repair the goods — whether or not the seller is actually a party to the contract, and whether or not the seller received a fee, commission, or other payment for selling it. In plain terms: a Manitoba dealership that merely arranges an extended warranty issued by a separate third-party administrator doesn't get to point the buyer toward that administrator when something goes wrong. The dealership that sold it remains answerable directly. The Act does carve out the individual salesperson specifically — an employee or sales person isn't made personally liable just because they're the one who handled the sale; the liability sits with the seller (the business), not the individual who processed the paperwork.

A separate track: a real minimum warranty on repair work itself

Manitoba also regulates a different thing entirely: the warranty a repair shop has to give on its own repair work, not an extended warranty sold with a vehicle purchase. The Consumer Protection Amendment Act (Motor Vehicle Work and Repairs), S.M. 2012, c. 14, received Royal Assent on June 14, 2012 and took effect July 1, 2013. It requires a written estimate before any repair over $100, and sets a mandatory minimum warranty on the repair itself of 90 days or 5,000 kilometres, whichever comes first — a floor the repairer must disclose to the customer, along with whatever other warranty it may separately offer beyond that minimum.

Two different questions, depending on what you're actually buying

If you're buying an extended warranty or service contract on a vehicle, the question is who sold it to you — that seller is who you have a direct legal claim against for the contract's performance, not just the underwriter named in the fine print. If you're instead having repair work done and the shop itself offers (or is silent about) a warranty on that specific job, Manitoba law sets a 90-day/5,000-km floor regardless of what the shop tells you verbally.

What this means for a Manitoba buyer

Keep the paperwork naming the business that actually sold you the extended warranty, not just the administrator's brand printed on the contract — that seller is your direct legal counterparty under the Act's liability provision if a covered repair gets refused. For repair work specifically, the 90-day/5,000-km minimum applies automatically; a shop can offer more, but can't lawfully offer less or stay silent about it.