Case study 1
Three unfiled years starting with the year of arrival
A newcomer had let three returns go unfiled, the earliest being the arrival year. The order of work mattered more than the speed of it: the arrival year had to be computed first, because the residency date and the prorated credits established there carry into the full years that follow. We settled the date, built the part-year computation, then prepared the later years on a consistent basis. The engagement produced a filed set of returns, a quantification of the balance and the late-filing exposure on each, and a residency chronology the file can be defended from.
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Case study 2
Emigrant who filed the departure year several years afterwards
The client had left Canada and only later discovered that the final year was still outstanding. We established the departure date from the facts of the move, prorated the claims measured by the period of residency, and removed those requiring residence for the whole year. Once the return produced a figure we set out how the late-filing penalty applied to the balance and how interest behaved differently from it. What the engagement produced was a filed departure-year return, a clear statement of what was owing, and a written record of the date the whole computation rests on.
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Case study 3
Benefit entitlement stalled behind an unfiled arrival year
A family's entitlement had been held up because the arrival-year return was outstanding, and the correspondence had been treated as a benefits problem rather than a filing one. It was a filing one. We prepared the arrival-year return on a part-year basis, distinguishing the claims reduced in proportion to the period of residency from those a part-year resident cannot make at all, and filed it. The engagement produced the filed year, a written explanation of why one of the household's claims could not be made for that year, and the basis on which the next year differs.
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Case study 4
Full-year return amended to part-year while the balance was open
The client had filed late and on a full-year basis, and had then started dealing with the penalty before the return was right. We reversed that order. The residency date was settled, the credits were recomputed over the period of residency, and the claims a part-year resident cannot make were withdrawn. Only then was the balance owing established and the late-filing exposure calculated against it. The engagement produced an amended arrival-year return, a recomputed balance, and a single letter dealing with both the correction and the penalty rather than two conversations at cross purposes.
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Case study 5
Two arrears years where one refunded and one owed
A newcomer had two outstanding years: the arrival year, which produced a refund once the prorated credits were claimed, and the following full year, which produced a balance. The consequences of lateness were therefore quite different on each. We prepared both, explained that the percentage penalty attaches to a balance owing and produces nothing in a refund year, and quantified the penalty and the daily compounding interest on the year that owed. The work produced both filings, a reconciliation between them, and a note recording why only one of the two years carried a charge.
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Case study 6
Demand to file received for an outstanding arrival year
A client brought in a demand to file covering the year they became resident, having read that a second late filing automatically doubles the penalty. We checked the two conditions for the higher rate, which are a demand to file and a late-filing penalty charged in one of the three preceding tax years, and established which of them was actually present on this file. The arrival-year computation was then prepared and filed. The engagement produced the filed return, a quantified balance, and a written position on which penalty rate applies and why.
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Case study 7
Ten Years of Missed Returns Filed as One Engagement
Filing many years at once is a sequencing problem: carry-forwards, instalments and credits from the earliest year feed the latest. Filing them out of order is what turns a recoverable position into an assessed one.
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Case study 8
Unreported Foreign Income Disclosed Before the CRA Asked
A voluntary disclosure has to be genuinely voluntary — once a letter arrives, the route usually closes. The engagement establishes whether the programme is still available, prepares the years, and puts the relief request in with the filing rather than after it.
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