Seniors Targeted? The Tax Audits Begin

The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) routinely reviews or audits tax filings, including personal, trust, corporate, and HST returns. The most common types of reviews that focus on personal tax returns include, but are not limited to, Pre-Assessment Reviews, Processing Reviews, and the Matching Program. This year there is a new focus: the Multigenerational Home Renovation Tax Credit introduced to help families better care for their elders. But claiming it, like other tax benefits, comes with a tax snare. Read on to learn more.

What did the April 19, 2020 Federal Budget tell us about required new approaches to retirement planning? Rising inflation is a new concern, and this requires a reworking of retirement projections, as well as projections for the funding of ongoing needs of survivors and heirs.  More specifically, there are two tax provisions to take note of:

An astounding 98% of Knowledge Bureau poll respondents have given CRA’s service standards a thumbs down this year. It’s not too late for you to weigh in, too and share your thoughts on the question: “In your view, has CRA’s service level to professional tax advisors improved this year?”

As your clients enter the 2nd half of their retirement years, there are many significant issues that begin to emerge such as illness, cost of care and loss of capacity for key decision makers. Without careful planning, years of effective decision making can be easily undone through increased costs of care and potentially increased costs of taxation.

There are three secrets to building a brand:  knowing your story, building a network, and sharing that story with your network.  On May 26th, we are giving you an exclusive opportunity to do so with a national networking opportunity. But there is one catch:  you will need to be prepared to have fun and build your professional connections.   

Doug Buss, RWM™ shares why he loved the RWM™ Designation program:  "It was a wonderful revitalization of the value that we are bringing to our clients." Get to know more about Doug, a Winnipeg native and outstanding sax player, too!

The April 19, 2021 Federal Budget is noteworthy for its length –731 pages in all –and its capacity to introduce billions of dollars of spending,while at the same time increasing tax complexity for individual filers. It also significantly enhances CRA’s digital footprint with new broad-based electronic filing measures. In introducing the measures, the government will focus on several key economicand social prioritiesincluding the national rollout of a $10-a-day childcareprogram and a $15 per hour minimum wage in the federally regulated private sector.