Welcome to the Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying's Online Assistance. This tutorial has been designed as part of the educational program and awareness efforts by the Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying.

This is one of seven tutorials dealing with the creation of a new in-house lobbyist (corporation) registration. It describes Step 7, which deals with the disclosure of information about communications.

Begin by logging into the registration system and going to the "Registrant Dashboard".

You may recall that after we entered the information in Step 6, we decided to pause our session. Because of this, when you look under the "Current Activities" tab, you will see beside "Pending registration" a link indicating that the registration is incomplete.

To open the return and complete Step 7, click on "Incomplete."

This will take you to the "Corporation Summary" page. Scroll down to the seventh section "Information about Communications."

Open this section by clicking "Edit Information about Communications" at the bottom right.

Select from the list each of the federal institutions you have already contacted or plan to contact. For each selection, click "Add to List" The page will refresh and the selected government institution will be listed in the "Government Institutions" panel. You must enter at least one institution.

For the purposes of our demonstration, "Simple Textile Incorporated" will be communicating with four government institutions: "Industry Canada", "Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada", "Canadian International Development Agency", and "Canadian International Trade Tribunal."

If the federal institution with which you will be communicating is not on the dropdown list, use the "Other government institution" field. Click "Add to list" to add it to the list.

You can enter as many institutions as you like. However, do not include institutions with which you think you "might" communicate. You have to select institutions with which you will probably communicate. It is also very important that the institutions you select be directly associated with the subject matter and details provided in Step 6.

Otherwise, approval of your return may be delayed.

To remove an institution from the list of federal institutions added, select the institution and click "Remove Selected".

Once the list of government institutions is complete, you have to identify the communication techniques you will be using for your lobbying activities.

The options for communication techniques are: written communication, oral communication and grassroots communication.

Written and oral communication includes email, letters, telephone conversations, and meetings.

Grassroots communication is a communication technique aimed at encouraging members of the public and organizations to communicate directly with public office holders, primarily through the media or advertising. The result is a large volume of letters, faxes and telephone calls to public office holders and public demonstrations.

Since this is the last step in the process of creating a return for a corporate registration, there is no "Save and Continue" button. Your options therefore are to save or cancel.

For the purposes of our demonstration, select "Save." This takes you to the "Corporation Summary" page, where you can verify the information you just entered.

If you find any errors, simply click "Edit Information about Communication" to go back and make corrections.

Note that a new button is now displayed in the bottom right corner: "Certify and Submit." This button is not displayed until all of the sections have been completed.

At this point, we want to pause our session. To go to the "Registrant Dashboard." click on"Return to Registrant Dashboard."

Note that because all of the sections of the return have been completed, the link beside "Pending Registration" changes from "Incomplete" to "Requires Certification"

All you have left to do is certify the return and officially submit it to the Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying. This procedure is explained in the tutorial called "Certification and Submission of Returns."

This concludes the tutorial. This was the seventh and last step in the process of completing a new in-house lobbyist (corporation) registration.

To access other tutorials or view the previous steps in creating a new in-house lobbyist (corporation) registration, use the navigation bar at the top of the page.

If you have any comments or questions about this tutorial, please contact us by phone at 613-957-2760 or by email at QuestionsLobbying@ocl-cal.gc.ca. You can also visit our website at www.ocl-cal.gc.ca.