Would my holding structure still be approved if I built it today?
That is the right question and it is the one a review answers. Many structures were assembled when treaty access was largely a documentary matter: form the entity, obtain the residence certificate, claim the rate. The conditions now examine purpose and substance as well as form, so a structure that was unremarkable when built can fail on facts that have not changed at all. Nothing about it has to have gone wrong for the answer to have changed. Test each entity against the conditions as they stand, and where an entity would not be granted access today, the choice is to give it substance or to take it out.
What is the principal-purpose test and does it apply to me?
It is an anti-abuse condition that denies a treaty benefit where obtaining that benefit was one of the principal purposes of the arrangement or transaction, unless granting it would accord with the treaty's object and purpose. It applies widely, so the practical question is not whether it applies but whether your arrangement satisfies it. Satisfying it is a question of evidence about why the structure exists: commercial reasons recorded when decisions were taken, functions the entities genuinely perform, and a purpose that survives the removal of the tax advantage. Contemporaneous evidence carries weight here; a rationale composed after an enquiry opens carries very little.
Why was our treaty claim refused when the paperwork was correct?
Because the paperwork answers a narrower question than the one being asked. A residence certificate establishes that a country regards the entity as resident. It does not establish that the entity is entitled to the benefit claimed, that it can satisfy the limitation-on-benefits conditions, or that obtaining the benefit was not a principal purpose of the arrangement. Those are factual questions about people, decisions and reasons. A refusal on those grounds is not a documentary defect to be cured by better forms; it is a conclusion about the structure, and the response is either evidence that the conclusion is wrong or a change to the structure.
Should we check the limitation-on-benefits position before paying a dividend?
Yes, and before rather than after. The clause sets objective conditions an entity must meet to claim under the treaty, tested against its ownership, its activities and where its income goes. Working through it in advance produces one of three answers: the entity qualifies and you can evidence it, it does not and the payment should be structured differently, or it qualifies on a basis that depends on facts you need to preserve. All three are useful. Discovering the answer after the payment is worse in every case, because the withholding has been accounted for, the recipient has booked the income and recovery depends on another country's repayment process.
Is it cheaper to add substance or to remove an entity?
It depends on whether the entity does anything you need. Substance is a recurring cost: people with real authority, premises, decisions taken locally and recorded, and the management attention to keep that true year after year. Removing a layer is a one-off exercise with its own consequences, and those have to be examined before committing, but it ends the annual cost and the position you would otherwise defend. In practice, an entity that exists for a commercial reason is usually worth resourcing, and an entity that exists only to improve a rate rarely is. Price both routes over several years rather than comparing a setup cost with a recurring one.
How often should a group review its treaty positions?
Whenever the facts move and periodically in between. The events that change the answer are ordinary business events: a director resigning or relocating, an acquisition inserting a layer nobody designed, an office closing, a payment flow being redirected, or a treaty being modified between the two countries. None of those look like tax events when they happen, which is why structures drift out of position quietly. A standing review against the structure chart, tied to a fixed point in the year, catches that. The alternative is discovering it when a payment is made and the benefit is refused, by which time the cash has already gone.
What is the treaty saving clause, and why does it matter to Americans abroad?
It is the provision that lets each country keep taxing its own residents and citizens as though the treaty did not exist. Because the United States taxes on citizenship, the saving clause is what stops an American in Canada or India using the treaty to remove US tax on ordinary income. A short list of articles is carved out of it — certain pensions, social security, government service, students — and those exceptions are where a treaty position for a US citizen usually lives. See our treaty work.
How do I find out whether Canada has a tax treaty with a particular country?
Canada has income tax conventions in force with more than ninety jurisdictions, and the Department of Finance publishes the status of each one — in force, signed but not yet in force, or under negotiation. Read two things, not one: the treaty text, and whether the Multilateral Instrument has modified it. A treaty printed before that modification can give you the wrong answer on entitlement. See where we work.
