When asked for an explanation of "Indian Demo-Chief," L’Oreal's Hotte-Dupuis said the name goes against their ethical principles and corporate values.

She also said the training memo had been translated from its original French into English, and "unfortunately, it is obvious that some of the intended meaning was lost in translation." As for the warning of auditing, Hotte-Dupuis said that in reference to the information "sales associates are required to keep the appropriate documents for government auditing purposes.



"This memo has since been amended and will be resent to all store employees," she said.



The NYX Cosmetics employee who spoke to BuzzFeed Canada said they decided to come forward because they hope customers “vote with their dollars.”

“I don’t want people to bash or be mean to [staff] in stores. They’re doing their best and they want to help people get makeup that works for them … L’Oréal owns everybody,” they said. “I’m glad I never had solid plans to make makeup my career, because I don’t think I’ll ever work in makeup again.”

Both L’Oréal employees say that before the training memo was sent, their stores had different approaches to status cards, such as removing all HST, asking for managers to authorize transactions, or telling customers to keep their receipt and file a tax rebate. As APTN News has reported, the Ministry of Revenue can’t penalize retailers for failing to comply with status card tax exemption. This is one reason why different retailers handle payment with a status card in different ways.



Alex Keenan, associate lawyer with Ottawa-based firm Nelligan O'Brien Payne LLP, explained that while it's not illegal to ask for more information, it's certainly improper.



"They're justified for proof of address, but asking for phone number, email address, there's no reason to ask for that and make it conditional. Nothing that makes it illegal — it's just a bad business practice," she said.



Keenen added that, unfortunately, this puts the onus on those with status cards to ensure they're getting the exemption. For those having trouble, she suggested speaking to a manager and, failing that, calling a Ministry of Finance hotline.



"There won't necessarily be any punishment for the retailer, but it gives [the Ministry] the idea there may be a problem," she sad.



BuzzFeed Canada decided to test the L’Oréal policy outlined in the training document by visiting several stores.

Ashley Bomberry, a 34, is Mohawk from Six Nations and carries a status card. We visited L’Oreal-owned stores in Toronto with Bomberry on four occasions.