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New Quarterly Newsletters (Q3 2024)

Two quarterly newsletters have been added – one dealing with personal issues, and one dealing with corporate issues….

Year-end planning for medical expense claims (September 2024)

While the current state of the Canadian health care system is far from perfect, Canadians are nonetheless fortunate to have a publicly funded health care system, in which most major medical expenses a…

Claiming the Canada Child Benefit (September 2024)

The federal government provides a number of non-refundable tax credits and benefits to Canadians under the umbrella term “child and family benefits”, but likely the most widely available and most…

GST/HST Break on Select Holiday Essentials

On November 21, 2024, the Prime Minister announced that the Government of Canada intends to provide temporary Goods and Services Tax/Harmonized Sales Tax (GST/HST) relief on select holiday essentials like groceries, restaurant meals, gifts, and children’s clothing.

Although these proposed changes are subject to parliamentary approval, consistent with standard practice, starting December 14, 2024, the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) will administer this GST/HST relief based on the proposed provisions once tabled in parliament.

If you are a GST/HST registrant with a reporting period that begins in 2024, you must file your returns electronically (except for charities and selected listed financial institutions). If you don’t, the Canada Revenue Agency may charge you a penalty.

The CRA will waive the penalty if you:

  • file monthly or quarterly and
  • were not previously required to file electronically and
  • are filing a GST/HST return for a filing period beginning on or after January 1, 2024, and before April 1, 2024

When to register for and start charging the GST/HST

You generally cannot register for a GST/HST account if you provide only exempt supplies .

You have to register for a GST/HST account if both situations apply:

New Quarterly Newsletters (Q3 2024)
Two quarterly newsletters have been added – one dealing with personal issues, and one dealing with corporate issues....
Year-end planning for medical expense claims (September 2024)
While the current state of the Canadian health care system is far from perfect, Canadians are nonetheless fortunate to have a publicly funded health care system, in which most major medical expenses a...
Claiming the Canada Child Benefit (September 2024)
The federal government provides a number of non-refundable tax credits and benefits to Canadians under the umbrella term “child and family benefits”, but likely the most widely available and most...
When help is available under the CRA’s Taxpayer Relief Provisions (September 2024)
Canada’s tax system is a self-assessing one, meaning that the onus rests on individual taxpayers to file their annual return each spring and to pay any amounts owed. The compliance rate in Canada is...
The benefits - and costs - of extending your mortgage (September 2024)
The past five years have been a tough financial slog for most Canadian families, as they struggled to cope with the pandemic, followed by inflation which tripled from under 2% in mid-2020 to over 6% b...
Aging in place – benefitting from the home accessibility tax credit (August 2024)
Members of the baby boom generation who were born between 1946 and 1965 are now between 59 and 78 years of age, and make up about a quarter of the Canadian population. Many, if not most, are now retir...
When are legal fees deductible? (August 2024)
In most cases, the need to seek out and obtain legal services (and to pay for them) is associated with life’s more unwelcome occurrences and experiences – a divorce, a dispute over a family estate...
Some tax breaks for the upcoming post-secondary school year (August 2024)
By the middle of August, most students who are beginning post-secondary education this fall have hopefully received an offer of admission from their college or university of choice and are in the fina...
Making the RRSP decision when you turn 71 (August 2024)
During the 2024 calendar year, hundreds of thousands of Canadians will reach their 71st birthday, and a significant percentage of that group are likely to have saved money for retirement through a reg...
Another option for retirement income planning (July 2024)
Most Canadians contemplate retirement with a mixture of anticipation and trepidation. While the benefits of an end to the day-to-day grind of work and commuting (while also having more free time to sp...
How to respond to a first Instalment Reminder from the Canada Revenue Agency (July 2024)
By the time summer arrives, nearly all Canadians have filed their income tax returns for the previous year, have received a Notice of Assessment from the tax authorities with respect to that return, a...
When the taxman has a few questions about your return (July 2024)
By this time of the year, virtually all Canadian residents have filed their income tax return for 2023 and have received the Notice of Assessment issued by the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) with respect...
The start of a new benefit year - what can you receive in 2024-25? (July 2024)
Most Canadians, understandably, think of our income tax system as a government “program” that takes money out of their paycheques and out of their pockets. And, while it’s certainly true that vi...
New Quarterly Newsletters (Q2 2024)
Two quarterly newsletters have been added – one dealing with personal issues, and one dealing with corporate issues....
Making a voluntary disclosure to the tax authorities (June 2024)
The Canadian tax system is a “self-assessing” one, in which taxpayers are expected (and, in most cases, required) to file an individual income tax return each spring. On that return the taxpayer p...
Getting tax help with summer child care costs (June 2024)
As the school year draws to a close, the thoughts of millions of Canadian parents turn to the question of how to find – and pay for – child care throughout the summer months. While many Canadians ...