The CRA has updated T4117 – Income Tax Guide to the Non-Profit Organization (NPO) Information Return (CRA). Certain non-profits that are NOT registered charities need to file the Form 1044 and this guide provides explanatory material on the CRA publication. …
Last year CRA moved its website from www.cra-arc.gc.ca/chrts-gvng/ to the super cool Ok it was not CRA moving their website but they were dragged kicking and screaming to the Government of Canada website. Giant waste of time and necessitating many…
The Tax Court of Canada in Isah, A. v. The Queen (TCC) deals with donations disallowed by CRA and the court ultimately decided to impose gross negligence penalties on the taxpayer who submitted fake official donation receipts. The Court discuss the test…
The Department of Finance is reviewing Canada's anti-money laundering and anti-terrorist financing regime. They have published a consultation paper at Reviewing Canada's Anti-Money Laundering and Anti-Terrorist Financing Regime. They are looking for submissions on the discussion paper before April 30, 2018. I have…
Here is CRA's List of Areas of Non-Compliance with Income Tax Provisions – Canadian Public Foundations.
Here is the CRA's List of Areas of Non-Compliance with Income Tax Provisions – Canadian Private Foundations.
The Senate has appointed a Special Committee on the Charitable Sector. For charity sector policy wonks this is absolutely amazing. Yes probably for 30-50 people it feels like Christmas is back again. The mandate is to “examine the impact of…
Here is the CRA's List of Areas of Non-Compliance with Income Tax Provisions – Canadian Charitable Organizations.
P113 – Gifts and Income Tax 2017 is the main CRA publication dealing with gifts and their income tax consequences for Canadian taxpayers. The publication has been revised with some minor changes in 2017. They reflect that the rules for…
Over the last 10 or more years, we have published over 2500 blog posts. Except for a few avid readers, that might be a little overwhelming so we have started to create a directory of some of the top resources…
We noted a few months ago that “CRA recently revokes registered charity status of 2 large religious groups doing foreign activities“. We provided the limited details that were available from the CRA Charities Listing at the time. Now here are…
The CRA has been working for years on the Charities IT Modernization Project or CHAMP. CHAMP is going to affect charity applications in that they will need to be filed electronically, as of November 2018. CHAMP will also allow charities to…
Here is an updated article on the difference between a conduit and a structured arrangement – it is entitled Canadian Charities and Foreign Activities: Conduit versus Structured Arrangement. .
In our note “CRA Questions on Charities Assisting Those Affected by the Conflict in Syria” it includes some common questions and answers from CRA on charities assisting those affected by the conflict in Syria.
Here is our note “Common Paragraphs for an Administrative Fairness Letter from the Charities Directorate of CRA“. It contains explanations of common concerns that CRA may find during an audit that, unless appropriately addressed, may result in various penalties, sanctions or…
In a presentation to E&Y Gary Huenemoeder of the Charities Directorate provided certain updated audit statistics for 2016-2017 which shows the outcomes of the CRA's completed audits. Audit statistics(2016-2017) •Audits completed –652 Results: •Clean audits –38 •Education letters issued –387…
In this article “Top 68 CRA Reasons for Denying your Canadian Registered Charity Application” we have obtained from CRA a list of some of the most common and not so common reasons for CRA to be concerned with a charity…
CRA has just released the 2018 T3010 Registered Charity Information Return. The T3010 is a form that Canadian registered charities need to file each year within six months of their fiscal year-end. Failure to file the return can quickly result in…
CRA recently released a short video on who is the true donor. These and other short videos are helpful for charities but nothing replaces real in person programs. Unfortunately, CRA has stopped their popular Charities Information Sessions (which were called “Road…
School boards can be registered charities. But school boards can also fit into another category of qualified donee that provides the ability to issue receipts with far less compliance obligations. CRA recently released a letter discussing whether school boards are…
If you are a Canadian charity operating outside of Canada you need to pay attention to whether there are sanctions relating to a particular country, business, organization, individual etc. You can see an updated list of at the Consolidated Special Economic Measures…
Ontario Not-for-Profit Corporations Act (ONCA) was passed in 2010 and supposed to come into force in July 2013. The Ontario government has announced that they were “working to bring ONCA into force as early as possible, with a target of early 2020”. …
A great deal has been written about legal compliance surrounding charities in Canada. Much of that material, however, is highly specialized, hard to understand, and sometimes esoteric. As a result, it can be difficult for charities, employees, and volunteers to…
Being a director of a Canadian registered charity is an important task and this article may be helpful in explaining some of the expectations and requirements of the position. Download PDF version There are approximately 600,000 Canadians who voluntarily serve…