Please note that the following document, although believed to be correct at the time of issue, may not represent the current position of the CRA.
Prenez note que ce document, bien qu'exact au moment émis, peut ne pas représenter la position actuelle de l'ARC.
Principal Issues: At the Fall TEI Roundtable, various questions were posed about the status of the Income Tax Folios.
Position: Comments provided.
Reasons: See below.
TEI Conference December 2012
Question and Answer #1(c)
1(c) Replacement of Income Tax Technical Publications with Income Tax Folios
The CRA recently announced the launch of Income Tax Folio publications (hereinafter "Folios") to update and supersede information currently found in the Income Tax Interpretation Bulletins and to improve web functionality. At the same time, the CRA announced that "all of the archived Income Tax Interpretation Bulletins, nine of the current Income Tax Interpretation Bulletins and all archived ITTNs were cancelled, effective September 30, 2012." Finally, to expedite the development and publication of the Folios, the Income Tax Rulings Directorate has undertaken an External Contributor Framework with external organizations.
We invite a discussion of the effect of the initiative and its timeline to completion based on the following questions:
i. Will the CRA be able to add resources or devote additional resources from other sources in order to ensure that taxpayers have access to income tax technical publications and that the Folios remain current? How is CRA prioritizing the development and issuance of the Folios? Will topics identified through the External Contributor Framework (i.e., by way of a submitted Topic Selection Form) receive priority consideration for updates?
ii. The webpage summarizing the Folio project states that the updates will require several years to complete. Can the CRA provide a timeline for completion as well as interim milestone dates (e.g., which Folio subjects it anticipates completing by particular dates)?
iii. Can the CRA provide additional explanation about the process, including why nine current ITs were cancelled before they were replaced by a Folio? Will the cancelled ITs subsequently be incorporated in a Folio? Can taxpayers rely on the positions included in the cancelled ITs until a Folio is issued with revised or restated guidance?
iv. Can the CRA clarify what an "archived" Advance Income Tax Ruling is and what (or how) taxpayers may be affected by their cancellation? The Folio announcement does not refer to the "archived Advance Income Tax Rulings," but all were cancelled effective September 30, 2012, along with "all archived Income Tax Bulletins," nine current Interpretation Bulletins, "all archived Income Tax Technical News," and "all archived Income Tax Directives."
Answer 1(c)(i)
For the foreseeable future, no additional resources will be available to the Income Tax Rulings Directorate for the Income Tax Folio Initiative. In light of this the Directorate has contacted several Liaison Organizations, including the TEI, with a view to soliciting the participation of tax professionals in the drafting of Folio Chapters. This collaboration will facilitate the more timely population of the Folio inventory.
In terms of prioritizing the Folio production, in 2011 we conducted internal and external consultation regarding the IT Bulletins. Additionally, we gathered data pertaining to Bulletin web hits on the CRA website as well as Bulletin usage data from the commercial tax publishers. Based on the information received, an initial priority list of approximately 54 Interpretation Bulletins was developed. Efforts are being made to begin the update process with Folio Chapters that will address the topics identified on the priority list. Liaison Organizations will be provided with the priority list as a starting point for individuals who may be interested in participating. This is not to say that offers to work on other updates would be refused.
Answer 1(c)(ii)
We hope to launch the Income Tax Folios with an initial publication of 10 12 Folio Chapters and have targeted early 2013 for these releases. This time frame is still subject to operational realities and may be subject to change. Beyond that, we have no specific timelines. Individual Folio Chapters will be published on an as-completed basis.
Answer 1(c)(iii)
In 2011, the IT Bulletins were reviewed by the subject matter experts within the Income Tax Rulings Directorate with a view to categorizing each based on the degree to which the information was outdated. One of the categories available was to designate the Bulletin as unnecessary or obsolete. The nine Bulletins cancelled were those that were placed in this category.
Formerly, an obsolete Bulletin would have been archived. Archived Bulletins were retained on the CRA website for historical purposes, but were prefaced by a warning that they should not be relied upon. However, we are now required to comply with updated standards applicable to all government Web sites. These standards limit the type of information that may be retained on the Web site. Because retaining information for historic purposes does not fit within the scheme of this policy for Web management, all archived Bulletins and ITTNs, as well as the nine Bulletins that were determined to be obsolete were cancelled and removed from the Web site.
As has always been the case with all archived or cancelled publications, the information contained therein may still have elements that remain applicable, but should not be relied upon.
Answer 1(c)(iv)
The CRA announcement in question confirmed that in keeping with a CRA policy to remove redundant, outdated and trivial information from its Web site, various publications would be cancelled and removed. Specifically referred to and hyperlinked were the following publications:
- All archived IT Bulletins
- Nine current IT Bulletins (as discussed above)
- All archived ITTNs
- All archived IT Directives and
- All archived ATRs
We understand that this question was posed because it was not realized that this announcement pertained only to materials published on the CRA Government of Canada Web site. We also understand that there was perhaps some confusion about the reference to the ATR line of publications. The ATRs were a product line whereby we published generic, representative rulings that applied to various common tax situations. Similar to the IT Bulletins, they were numbered chronologically, from ATR 01 ATR 70.
In 1996, when all technical interpretations and advance income tax rulings were made available to the commercial publishers, the ATRs were archived. The materials available through the commercial publishers superseded the ATRs for usefulness and currency.
Notwithstanding the cancellation of the archived ATRs, severed income tax rulings will continue to be available from the commercial publishers, just as they have been since 1996. Furthermore, the commercial publishers were given early notice of the pending cancellations, in order to provide the opportunity to preserve the content of the publications in question in their subscription materials.
Renée Shields
2012-046891
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