Changes to Paper Filing Disempowering

Last tax season, only 7% of all Canadian tax filers filed on paper. The CRA is pushing for zero. It continues to steer the holdouts to digitized filing by adding lots of obstacles. Most recently, it is removing almost all the schedules from the tax return package it mails. This seems unfair to people who paper file because they can’t afford a computer and internet, distrust the security of online filing and those who are neither tax or computer literate. Here’s what they are up against:

It’s a well-known fact that the next decade will see an enormous amount of money transferred from one generation to the next in Canada. According to a 2016 CIBC study, there is $750 billion at stake. Your clients, and your high-net-worth clients in particular, will be looking to you to help them preserve their family wealth, if they aren’t already.

“I think self-awareness is probably the most important thing toward being a champion.” —Billie Jean King

From cell phones to airplanes, building and coins, ore is indispensable in modern life; but, like many other outputs, the work people do to bring it to market is being impacted by the A.I. Revolution. Similar disruptive changes affect the advice tax and financial advisors give their clients.

Join our online discussion: When changes in the industry force professionals to adapt, should we call them threats, or are they opportunities?

The 100th anniversary of personal income tax is coming up on September 20! On that day in 1917, The Income War Tax Act received Royal Assent, heralding in the first personal income taxes in Canada. Perhaps it’s high time you tackled the challenge and mastered the tax return and all it’s nuances? It’s an investment that could really pay off for you.

Karen Stokowski, a tax professional in Holden, Alta., has this to say about the Distinguished Advisor Conference