Time’s Up: CRA’s 100 Day Mandate for Improvement

After years of frustration on the part of tax professionals and taxpayers alike, the Finance Minister ordered the Canada Revenue Agency to clean up its act in 100 days. Specifically, the improvement plan was to run from September 2 through December 11. Finance Minister and Minister of National Revenue, Francoise-Phillippe Champagne instructed CRA to fix “unacceptable wait times and service delays.” Time’s up this week and CRA has released an update on progress. What gets measured, gets done. Let’s see what CRA’s metrics show. 

Distinguished Delegates at DAC 2022 were asked to get out of their comfort zones and make new, big goals to embrace what will be a difficult 2023 for their clients as a recession looms, CRA audits and recall of bank loans darken the horizon.  At the same, time, however, there has never been a more perfect opportunity to add the highest value as professionals in the accounting, tax, bookkeeping and financial services. Twenty-four outstanding thought leaders made their case for building Velocity in anticipation of their enhanced services this year.

The 2022 Distinguished New Advisor of the Future Award Winner is a 35-year veteran of the financial services industry who has re-engineered his practice to epitomize what it takes to pivot and become the advisor of the future.  Doug Buss, of Winnipeg, has 6 staff members at YourStyle Financial and plans to double his assets under management over the next 5 years. 

CRA has announced the fourth quarter prescribed interest rates and as expected, they rose again.  It is now very expensive to owe money to the CRA, and any taxpayer who does, is well advised to pay off that debt as soon as possible. The prescribed interest rates for October 1 to December 31 are as follows:

Inflation continues to be top of mind for most of us as we see prices increase at the grocery store, gas station, and pretty much everywhere else.  Advisors and clients can build out defensive strategies with a better understanding of inflation in today’s context; the subject of this, the first of a three-part series.

By definition, payroll remittances are mandatory statutory deductions withheld from an employee’s pay by an employer for the purposes of funding government programs.  But are they a tax? The answer is yes, and this is why:

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