While for the most part many businesses deal with the small tax related items when it comes to Canada tax which are annoying enough there are some bigger aspects that have to be dealt with by some companies.    These are tax rulings.    Often they will rely on the tax accountants to interpret the tax laws needed to file their tax returns, but on occasion there will be a need to ask the CRA to rule on a matter.

In the past this type of request has taken forever, and can really slow the progression of a business down. Based on these rulings a Company may take a different course of direction and while waiting for the decision they are held in limbo.

The CRA has stated that in part 8 of their 12 step Red Tape Reduction Plan that they will be focusing on this area.    Usually this centers around GST/HST rulings

Moving onto the reporting requirements is another area of interest for small business. It seems every time you turn around some department of the CRA is issuing a reporting requirement.   The way that the CRA will tackle this is by scaling down the need for this.   It will be an elimination of some types of reports or combining some.    Either way when this comes into effect it will mean a lot less headaches for many businesses and a whole lot less time wasted.   It may mean there will be a need for amendments to legislation though which means they will have to petition the Department of Finance for this.

Finally in the last segment of this particular review of the red tape cutting we can look at filing frequency. How beneficial any of the proposed changes will be to you, will depend on your business and your degree of involvement with GST/HST.

We have covered 3 small but significant proposed areas of changes here. Again this change program that the Government is touting is only impressive when you view it on the whole, because each business has their own tax headaches and frustrations.

In our next review we will be covering the remainder of the Red Tape Action Plan, and then you will have the personal decision of determining what’s really in it for you.