My name is Mark Goodfield. Welcome to The Blunt Bean Counter ™, a blog that shares my thoughts on income taxes, finance and the psychology of money. I am a Chartered Professional Accountant. This blog is meant for everyone, but in particular for high net worth individuals and owners of private corporations. My posts are blunt, opinionated and even have a twist of humour/sarcasm. You've been warned. Please note the blog posts are time sensitive and subject to changes in legislation or law.

Monday, April 8, 2019

Confessions of a Tax Season Accountant — 2019 Edition

For the first four years of this blog, I wrote a series titled “Confessions of a Tax Accountant” during income tax season. Those posts would discuss interesting or contentious income tax and filing issues that arose as I prepared my clients’ tax returns. (One of my favourite of that series was this post that also included an ode to the Maple Leafs. I’ve since realized that I should stick to financial topics and leave the odes to professional writers. However, once a Leaf fan, always a Leaf fan. I wish them good luck with the Big Bad Bruins as they start another pursuit of the Cup on Thursday. Go Leafs Go.)

Today, I go old school and bring back the tradition with some new confessions to cleanse my tax soul.

I have only received the tax information for around 53% of my clients as of April 6th; as the remainder are waiting for their final T3 and T5013 slips to arrive and Easter is later this year. But I’ve still accumulated enough confessions to get off my chest. (By the way, the fact the T5013 essentially only has numerical boxes with no written descriptions continues to drive both clients and accountants mad.)

TOSI


This year marks the first year of implementation of the controversial tax on split income (“TOSI”) rules. If you have been a reader of this blog, you will know all about this issue. If you are a new reader or need a refresher, you can read this BDO publication on income splitting.

In general, TOSI has not been a huge issue for my clients this year (tax return wise) when considering their children, because many of them already stopped using their family trusts or private corporations to pay dividends to their children in 2018. This is because of the punitive TOSI rules for children (typically between age 18-24), which became effective January 1, 2018.

However, spouses are another story. Where spouses have received dividends, it must be determined whether the dividend is subject to TOSI or meets one of the exemptions. There is an excluded business exception for any family member who is at least 18 years of age and worked on average at least 20 hours a week in the business in the current year, during the part of the year in which the business operates. This exclusion will also be met if in a total of five previous taxation years of the individual the 20-hours-per-week test has been satisfied. Note that this is true even if the five years occurred at any time in the past. The years do not need to be in succession.

Many clients are still trying to determine whether their spouse's met/meet this test, and we cannot file their returns until that final determination is made.

U.S. capital gains reports


We continue to receive realized capital gains reports for clients for their U.S. brokerage accounts in U.S. dollars only. These reports are deceiving, as they have not converted the original purchase and sale into the Canadian-dollar equivalent at the time of the original purchase and at the sale dates. Thus, by missing the foreign exchange component, the reported gain is often way out of whack.

Donations and medical expenses


Several clients provide their donations and medical receipts in their own packages (i.e., each spouse provides me their own donations and medical receipts). I am not sure if this is done for simplicity or whether they do not realize that in almost all cases, we claim the donations and medical credits on only one spouse’s return to maximize the claim.

Missing T2202A for students


As per the recent blog post “The Top Tax Tips for Students,” students need to print out their T2202A tuition receipt from their student portal. I would say for 80% of the returns for which there is a student in the family, we have not received the receipt and I must request it be printed out. So, students and parents: ensure this form is retrieved.


RRSP withholdings


I had a couple of clients withdraw money from their RRSP this year for income smoothing purposes. The problem is the statutory withholding tax for RRSPs is only 10% for withdrawals up to $5,000, only 20% for withdrawals between $5,000 and $15,000 and 30% for withdrawals over $15,000. These withholding rates are often less than the actual marginal tax rate of the client and result in a surprise tax liability. For example, if you took out $15,000, the withholding rate is only 20%, but the actual tax rate when you file your return could be 42% — thus you would have a 22% shortfall.

That’s it for my confessions. I hope your tax return results in a refund or at least less tax than you anticipated.

The content on this blog has been carefully prepared, but it has been written in general terms and should be seen as broad guidance only. The blog cannot be relied upon to cover specific situations and you should not act, or refrain from acting, upon the information contained therein without obtaining specific professional advice. Please contact BDO Canada LLP to discuss these matters in the context of your particular circumstances. BDO Canada LLP, its partners, employees and agents do not accept or assume any liability or duty of care for any loss arising from any action taken or not taken by anyone in reliance on the information on this blog or for any decision based on it.

Please note the blog posts are time sensitive and subject to changes in legislation.

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