CRA wins case in opposition to distant employee claiming shifting bills

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Tax season is now underway, and should you moved in 2024, you could be entitled to put in writing off your shifting bills, assuming you qualify. Not all strikes, nevertheless, qualify as an “eligible relocation,” and the power to deduct shifting bills might be challenged by the taxman, which is what occurred in a current case determined earlier this month. However earlier than delving into the main points of this newest case, let’s briefly evaluate the foundations for deducting shifting bills.

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Beneath the Revenue Tax Act, you’ll be able to deduct shifting bills for an eligible relocation, which is a transfer that permits you to work (or to attend college) at a brand new work location, offered the transfer brings you no less than 40 kilometres nearer to your new work (or college) location. The bills might be deducted from the earnings you earned at your new work (or college) location.

However can you’ve got eligible relocation if you find yourself working from dwelling, and proceed to work out of your new dwelling, such that your shifting bills are tax deductible?

That was the difficulty on this current case involving an Ontario taxpayer who claimed almost $67,000 of shifting bills on her 2021 tax return for a transfer she made in early February of that yr. The Canada Income Company denied her declare for shifting bills, and she or he took the matter to Tax Courtroom.

Within the years at concern, the taxpayer was employed as a territory account supervisor for a expertise firm who was accountable for promoting the corporate’s software program and technical companies. She spent most of her time interacting in conferences with potential and current prospects. Previous to the pandemic, she labored primarily from the corporate’s Toronto workplaces, however this modified in March 2020 when the company workplaces had been closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and she or he started working from her dwelling in Mississauga.

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As soon as she started working from dwelling, her buyer conferences had been typically performed just about. This introduced a number of challenges, as she lived together with her husband and two younger sons on the highest flooring of their residence and rented out her basement to her sister and her household. She didn’t have a personal workplace house in her Mississauga dwelling and located that she was usually distracted by “the rambunctious actions of her two boys, who usually interrupted her buyer conferences.”

The taxpayer’s compensation construction consisted of a mixture of wage and fee, which was based mostly on her gross sales. She thought-about her gross sales targets to be excessive, and famous that as she met them, her targets for the next yr subsequently elevated. She frightened whether or not she would have the ability to attain these new targets the next yr given the challenges she skilled in working from her Mississauga dwelling.

Because of this, within the fall of 2020, the taxpayer and her husband began to search for a brand new dwelling, finally discovering one in Campbellville, which was about 40 kilometres from her Mississauga dwelling. The taxpayer and her household moved into the brand new dwelling in February 2021. The brand new dwelling had a basement, which she may use as a personal workplace, and a a lot bigger outside house the place her kids may play and thereby occupy their time. She testified that the additional outside house additionally allowed her to rent a instructor for the kids to allow them to be taught extra about nature and additional occupy their time whereas she was working from her dwelling workplace.

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Whereas the taxpayer acknowledged that the Mississauga residence additionally had a basement, which she may have used as a personal workplace, she testified that she was unable to make use of the house because it was being rented to her sister. When in the end she did transfer to the brand new residence, her sister and household had been capable of finding appropriate new lodging on their very own.

The decide agreed that the time period eligible relocation within the tax act should be interpreted in a fashion that acknowledges the fact that, significantly within the post-pandemic work surroundings, many Canadians do business from home and, similar to Canadians who work in a extra conventional workplace setting, they need to have the ability to entry the advantage of the shifting expense deduction the place acceptable. That being stated, the decide added that it should even be acknowledged that “Parliament didn’t intend for the deduction to be obtainable the place an individual relocates primarily for private causes.”

In different phrases, to ensure that the eligible relocation take a look at within the act to not be rendered meaningless the place an individual with a house workplace strikes to a brand new dwelling with a brand new dwelling workplace, the taxpayer should have the ability to clearly exhibit that the relocation primarily occurred to allow the taxpayer to be employed on the new location, and never for private causes.

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Whereas the decide was sympathetic and expressed “little doubt” that the taxpayer’s new dwelling offered her with a greater work surroundings than she had beforehand, he couldn’t settle for that the taxpayer’s main motivation behind the relocation was to allow her to retain her employment. In spite of everything, the taxpayer admitted in cross-examination that at no time did her employer specific any dissatisfaction with the work she was doing whereas figuring out of the Mississauga residence or recommend {that a} transfer may be crucial for her to retain her employment. She met her targets and was paid the total commissions for which she was eligible.

As well as, the taxpayer was obscure in her testimony as as to if her do business from home standing can be short-term. Because the decide famous, it’s a lot much less probably that the relocation of an individual’s dwelling workplace could possibly be primarily motivated by employment issues, the place such individual is working from dwelling on a brief foundation, or in a scenario that’s more likely to be short-term.

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Lastly, the decide famous that each properties had a basement that might have been used as an workplace, and the truth that her sister was dwelling within the Mississauga dwelling and paying hire didn’t look like an obstacle to her figuring out of her outdated dwelling and was not an element necessitating her shifting to a brand new dwelling.

Because of this, the decide was unable to conclude that the taxpayer’s relocation occurred to allow her to be employed working on the new residence for functions of the definition of eligible relocation, and thus her shifting bills weren’t tax deductible.

Jamie Golombek, FCPA, FCA, CFP, CLU, TEP, is the managing director, Tax & Property Planning with CIBC Personal Wealth in Toronto. Jamie.Golombek@cibc.com.

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