Can a condo meeting be recorded in Quebec?

No article of the Civil Code authorizes or prohibits it. But a voice is personal information (s. 2 of the private-sector privacy Act): the syndicate must decide beforehand why it records (s. 4), record only what is necessary (s. 5), inform each person (s. 8) and destroy the recording once the purpose is achieved (s. 23). The minutes remain the official record.

Does every participant have to consent to the recording?

That is the safe path. The Civil Code forbids invading a person's privacy without consent or legal authorization (art. 35 CCQ) and names capturing their voice (art. 36 CCQ). Consent must be manifest, free and enlightened (s. 14): a co-owner who refuses must still be able to attend, speak and vote without being recorded.

Is the meeting recording part of the syndicate's register?

No. The register contains the minutes of the meetings of co-owners and of the board (art. 1070 CCQ), not recordings. The recording is a tool for writing the minutes, which the board sends to co-owners within 30 days (art. 1102.1 CCQ).

How long should a meeting recording be kept?

As long as it serves the stated purpose (s. 23). No statute sets a period, but an action to annul a decision of the assembly must be brought within 90 days (art. 1103 CCQ): keeping the recording until the minutes are sent or until that window closes is justified, unless a dispute is under way.

Can a co-owner get a copy of the recording?

They can get a copy of the recording of their own voice, or a written transcript of it (s. 27), with a written answer within 30 days (s. 32). Other participants' words are removed when releasing them could seriously harm those people (s. 40).

Recording a Condo Meeting in Quebec: Consent and Law 25

Quick answer: in Quebec, no article of the Civil Code authorizes or prohibits recording a meeting of co-owners or a board meeting. But a person's voice is personal information: the syndicate must say why it records, obtain the free consent of each person recorded, and destroy the recording once that purpose is achieved. The minutes remain the official record.

Since assemblies moved online, the question comes up with every notice of meeting. The secretary would like to listen again before writing the minutes, a co-owner wants to know who will hear what they said about a neighbour's water damage, and someone suggests "letting the AI write the summary".

This article answers the legal question first, under the Civil Code and the Act respecting the protection of personal information in the private sector (the Act that Law 25 amended), then shows how CondoAide applies those rules.

May the syndicate record a meeting?

The law neither provides for it nor forbids it. The Civil Code allows an assembly to be held by means that let all participants communicate immediately with each other (article 1088.1 CCQ), and lets directors attend a board meeting the same way (article 1084.1 CCQ). It says nothing about recording. The rules for the online meeting itself are in Virtual condo meeting in Quebec: quorum, voting and proxies.

A voice is personal information. Personal information is any information that concerns a natural person and allows that person to be identified, directly or indirectly (section 2 of the Act). The Act applies whatever form the information takes, written, graphic, visual, computerized or sound (section 1). The condo syndicate is subject to it, as we explain in Law 25 for Quebec condo syndicates.

Recording a meeting is therefore collecting personal information. Before doing so, the syndicate must have a serious and legitimate reason and must determine the purposes of the recording (section 4). It may collect only what is necessary for those purposes (section 5).

A defensible purpose: helping the secretary write accurate minutes, and checking what was said while a decision can still be challenged. Keeping it "just in case", with no end date, is not one. And if the voice is enough, there is no reason to keep the participants' video as well.

Yes, that is the safe path, and each person decides only for themselves. The Civil Code protects privacy: no one may invade a person's privacy without that person's consent or without the law authorizing it (article 35 CCQ). Among the invasions it lists are capturing or using a person's voice while they are in private premises, and intercepting a private communication (article 36 CCQ). No statute expressly authorizes a syndicate to record its meetings. A meeting of co-owners is not open to the public, and people discuss arrears, insurance claims and disputes between neighbours there. Each recorded person's consent is therefore the most solid footing.

Consent has to be real. It must be manifest, free and enlightened, given for specific purposes, requested for each purpose in clear and simple terms, and presented separately from any other information (section 14). Consent that does not meet those conditions is without effect.

Three practical consequences:

Saying no must cost nothing. A co-owner has the right to attend the meeting, speak and vote. If the only way to take part is to accept the recording, the consent is not free.
Silence is not consent. Consent must be manifest (section 14): "nobody objected" does not show that everyone agreed. Each person needs to act, and that act needs a trace.
A refusal applies on the spot. If someone refuses, their voice must not end up in the file. With a single microphone picking up the whole room, one refusal is enough to keep that microphone off the recording.

People may also withdraw their consent along the way, and the syndicate must tell them so (section 8).

What the notice must say

The person must be informed when the information is collected (section 8):

Why the meeting is recorded;
How it is recorded (which device, voice only or video too);
Their rights of access and rectification;
Their right to withdraw consent;
where applicable, the third parties the recording will be communicated to, such as the service that hosts it, and the possibility that it is communicated outside Quebec.

For the consent to be enlightened, add the two things people want to know before answering: who will be able to listen, and how long the recording is kept.

Announce the recording in the notice of meeting, so nobody discovers it on arrival. Then ask each person for consent before they join, and repeat it when the meeting opens.

Is the recording part of the register or the minutes?

No. The minutes remain the official record. The syndicate's register contains the minutes of the meetings of co-owners and of the board of directors (article 1070 CCQ). No provision requires a recording to be filed there. What the board sends to co-owners is the minutes, within 30 days of the assembly (article 1102.1 CCQ) or of the board meeting (article 1086.1 CCQ).

The recording is a tool for writing those minutes, not an audio version of them, and its transcript does not have to go into the register. A passage the secretary copies into the minutes becomes part of them and follows their retention. We cover that work in Condo meeting minutes in Quebec: deadlines and signing.

How long should it be kept?

As long as it serves the stated purpose, and then it must be destroyed. Once the purposes are achieved, personal information must be destroyed or anonymized, subject to a retention period provided by law (section 23). No statute sets a retention period for the recording of a condo meeting.

The Civil Code offers a useful benchmark. A co-owner may ask the court to annul a decision of the assembly, but the action must be brought within 90 days of the meeting (article 1103 CCQ). The same 90 days apply to challenging a decision of the board of directors (article 1086.2 CCQ). Keeping the recording until the minutes are sent, or until that window closes, fits the stated purpose. Keeping it for years does not.

One exception: a dispute. When a decision is challenged, the parties must preserve the relevant evidence (article 20 of the Code of Civil Procedure), so the board suspends destruction and notes why.

Write these periods into the syndicate's governance policy, which must cover the retention and destruction of personal information (section 3.2).

Who may listen, and can a co-owner ask for a copy?

Access is limited to what the purpose requires. The syndicate must take security measures that are reasonable given, among other things, the information's sensitivity and medium (section 10). An audio file emailed to the whole board and then forwarded does not meet that standard. Decide before the meeting who may listen (the board only, or co-owners too), and say so in the notice.

Everyone is entitled to a copy of their own information. On request, the syndicate must confirm that it holds personal information about a person and let them obtain a copy, and computerized information must be provided as a written transcript if they ask (section 27). A recorded person can therefore ask for the recording of their voice, or its transcript. The syndicate's person in charge of protecting personal information answers in writing within 30 days (section 32). Access is free, though reasonable fees for reproduction or transmission may be charged if the approximate amount is announced first (section 33).

Other people's words are protected. The syndicate must refuse to release anything that would likely reveal personal information about a third person when that could seriously harm them, unless that person consents (section 40). That is one more reason to record each person on their own track: one voice can be handed over without the others.

A person can also ask for their voice to be removed. They may require the correction of information whose collection or retention is not authorized by law (section 28). If consent was the basis for the recording and it is withdrawn, keeping their voice becomes hard to justify, unless a dispute is under way.

What about guests?

The property manager, the syndicate's lawyer, a contractor presenting a quote: their voice is personal information just like a co-owner's. They get the same notice, make the same choice, and refusing does not stop them from taking part. Once the meeting is over, the syndicate rarely has a reason to keep a one-time guest's name.

And AI summaries?

That is a second purpose, and it calls for a second choice.

A new use needs consent. Personal information may be used only for the purposes for which it was collected, unless the person consents (section 12), and consent is requested for each purpose (section 14). A person may accept having their voice recorded for the minutes and refuse having their words passed to an AI model. Ask for the two separately.

Where the processing happens matters. Before communicating personal information outside Quebec, the syndicate must conduct a privacy impact assessment, and the communication must be covered by a written agreement (section 17). Pasting a transcript into a consumer chatbot often means sending it outside Quebec. Adopting a system that collects or keeps personal information also calls for a privacy impact assessment (section 3.3), proportionate to how sensitive the information is.

A summary is a draft. It can miss a nuance: the secretary reviews it and remains the author of the minutes.

No voice recognition. Recognizing a person by the characteristics of their voice is biometrics: to verify or confirm someone's identity that way, the law requires the person's express consent and prior disclosure to the Commission d'accès à l'information (section 44 of the Act to establish a legal framework for information technology). Recording one track per signed-in participant avoids the problem: you know who is speaking without analysing their voice.

How CondoAide records meetings

Since 14 October 2026, CondoAide records assemblies and board meetings held in its built-in video, as well as the syndicate's ad hoc video meetings. Here is how the tool applies the rules above.

The board decides, meeting by meeting. Recording is off by default. When the board turns it on for an assembly, the emailed notice of meeting announces it: why, what is recorded, who can listen, for how long, and that refusing changes nothing about the right to attend, speak and vote.
Each person chooses before joining. A consent card explains the purpose, what is recorded, who can listen, the retention period and the person's rights. It offers two equally weighted options with nothing preselected: "Accept recording" and "Take part without being recorded". Guests make the same choice. We keep the time of consent and the version of the notice that was read.
Only consenting voices are recorded, each on its own track. Video is not recorded. The voice of someone who refuses is in no file, and anyone can withdraw consent at any time during the meeting.
The room microphone at a hybrid assembly is recorded only if the chair, after reading a notice to the people present, attests that each of them consents. One objection, and the chair does not start it.
The board chooses who can listen to an assembly: the board only (recommended), the co-owners whose voice was recorded, or all co-owners. A board meeting can be heard only by the sitting directors and, if there is one, the manager. Every listen is logged. The recordings a person may hear are gathered under "Recordings".
Destruction is automatic. An assembly recording is destroyed 90 days after the meeting, or when the minutes are sent if that is later (180 days at most), unless the board announced in the notice that it keeps it until the minutes are adopted at the next assembly (13 months at most). A board meeting recording is destroyed after 90 days, an ad hoc meeting after 30 days, along with its guests' names. If there is a dispute, the board can suspend destruction, recording the reason.
"Remove a person": at a recorded person's request, the board deletes their whole track and their passages from the transcript. The recording is rebuilt without their voice.
The AI summary is optional, included in the Pro and Gestionnaire plans. Each recorded person accepts or refuses, separately, that their words be used for it. The secretary finds an "AI summary" for each agenda item, reviews it, then adds it to the draft minutes with "Insert into the notes". The summary is destroyed when the minutes are sent.
Nothing leaves Quebec. The transcript (Whisper) and the summary (an open-weight language model) are produced by CondoAide on its own server in Beauharnois. Each passage is attributed to the signed-in person it came from, never by recognizing their voice.

Paid plans include 20 to 80 hours of recording per month, depending on the plan. Retention periods and rights are set out in our privacy policy. For the feature itself, see the release note.

What the tool does not do for you: decide whether a given meeting is worth recording, choose who may listen, answer an access request, or write the minutes. Those decisions belong to the board.

Frequently asked questions

Can a co-owner record the assembly on their phone?

The board does not control what a participant does on their own side, but the chair can ask at the start that nobody record by other means. A recording made without the others' knowledge is not a syndicate document, and it does not replace the minutes.

Can we turn away a co-owner who refuses to be recorded?

No. The right to attend, speak and vote does not depend on the recording. Consent obtained on that condition would not be free (section 14); the person's voice is simply not recorded.

Can the recording be used as evidence in court?

It can be relevant if a decision is challenged, and the board must then preserve it rather than destroy it. That is why the 90-day window (article 1103 CCQ) and the suspension of destruction in a dispute matter. How a court will treat it depends on the case: that is a question for the syndicate's lawyer.