CRA issued a few new guidances today, including a guidance on the advancement of education: CG-030, Advancement of education and charitable registration. This is a welcome new guidance that explains what CRA expects from a charity or an entity applying…
Today, CRA released it’s new Guidance, CG-029, Relief of poverty and charitable registration. This relatively short guidance provides some useful information on what CRA considers to be charitable activities that relieve poverty. As so many charities are involved with relief…
CRA released today the updated guidance CG-002, Canadian registered charities carrying on activities outside Canada. Essentially, this guidance deals with Canadian charities conducting foreign activities. About 5000 Canadian registered charities conduct foreign activities every year. Over the next 10 years…
Our firm has been using online tools for over 10 years – primarily webinars. In 2018, we moved to providing paid online courses dealing with charity and non-profit legal compliance and risk management to the non-profit and charity sector as…
The CRA has service standards and the Charities Directorate publishes those service standards. The service standards are for “enquiries” and “charity applications”. At the moment, despite COVID, anecdotally it seems that CRA has been quite quick in their responses especially…
[Update – the motion to extend the period within ONCA can be brought into force was carried on September 21, 2020.] As we have noted before, ONCA was passed in 2010 and it was never brought into force. Unless…
While restrictions are easing up and businesses are getting back to work, now is still a good time for registered charities to get on to CRA’s new Digital Services for Charities. CRA launched this new online services a year ago…
The Charities Directorate of CRA sent out an email today to their electronic mailing list. The full text is below and our comments are in [brackets and italics]. If you want the boring stuff from CRA then you should definitely…
We have recently added 2 new full-day courses namely Fundamentals of Running a Canadian Charitable Organization/Operating Charity and Fundamentals of Running a Private or Public Foundation in Canada. These are in-depth courses which will help those who run operating charities…
Here are a number of trends or compliance suggestions for charities over the next six months: If you are an Ontario corporation under the Ontario Corporations Act (OCA) (which is now 113 years old) – seriously consider transferring your organization’s…
If you have submitted an online charity application using CRA’s Digital Services for Registered Charities, you may have received or may still receive a letter saying that your application is incomplete because they never received your organization’s corporate documents. This…
The Ontario government has asked for comments on regulations affecting the new Ontario Not-For-Profit Corporations Act (ONCA). The deadline is today. ONCA consultation: Proposed regulations to support proclamation of the Not-for-Profit Corporations Act, 2010 (also here is a PDF of…
CRA has been processing charity applications during the COVID pandemic – even when they were “shut down”. This recent CRA notice advises charities that if they have a deadline to respond to on a charity application that the deadline will…
A qualified donee is an organization that can issue official donation receipts for gifts it receives from individuals and corporations. It can also receive gifts from registered charities. A qualified donee can be: a registered charity (including a registered national…
Here is our Blumbergs’ Canadian Charity Legal Checklist for Working with Intermediaries in Canada 2020. It will be of help to Canadian registered charities that work with/hire non-charities such as businesses, non-profits or individuals to carry out work for the…
In this brief note, we try to suggest ten steps for a simplified contractor arrangement between a Canadian charity and a group in Canada that is not a charity (the “Intermediary”) implementing a project for the Canadian charity in Canada. …
We have just prepared a new course on Canadian Charities Working with Non-Charities in Canada. Here is information on the new course and how to register. I was quite disappointed that certain organizations have misrepresented the ability of Canadian charities…
It has been over 4 weeks that many businesses, non-profits and charities in Canada have either been shut down or are trying hard to adjust to the frequently changing environment. The initial adrenaline has worn off, the days are melting…
The Canadian Federal government announced today a loosening of the rules relating to journalism subsidies and also the new qualified donee category “Canadian journalism organization”. This will make it easier for some organizations to obtain subsidies. Here is the full…
The CRA’s Charities Directorate is currently closed, however, registered charities can still access online services through what we affectionately call the CHAMP system but CRA now refers to as “Digital Services for Charities through the MyBA portal”. While registered charities…
At this point in time, we are recommending that all charities sign up for CRA’s MyBA system, as it allows organizations to submit T3010 filings and to complete other transactions or make changes with CRA via this online tool. This…
CRA is now more actively encouraging Canadian registered charities to file their annual T3010 online. Makes a lot of sense in light of the current COVID-19 pandemic. On March 8, 2020, which seems a long time ago I wrote a…
Update on March 26, 2020 Corporations Canada has now advised us today that with snail mail they will be having at the moment a staff person come in and sort the mail twice per week. So our suggestion still stands…
The Charities Directorate has announced that they are largely shut down at the moment. Many changes or filings can be done online and now may be a good time to checkout CRA’s online offerings. There are some CRA staff outside…