Road To Canada Forums

Hello, my good friends. It's been a terribly long time. You were of such great help to us while my wife was immigrating. I believe you've also been aiding mutual friends of ours going through a similar situation, recently.

We have a tax question I was thinking you might be able to assist us with. Basically, the CRA is requesting proof of my wife's world income before they'll issue me my GST credits, and Ontario requires the same with regard to the HST credit.

Our timeline:

Nov. '07 - Married in the U.S. (wife quits job)
Dec. '07 - Returned to Canada (my wife as a legal visitor)
Jun. '09 - Wife attained PR!
Aug.(?) '09 - Wife got first job in Canada--only job since '07, in the U.S.
Apr. '10- Wife returned to the U.S. for the first time, on vacation for a few weeks

2008 Tax Return: My wife did not file in Canada or the U.S., as she had no income to report (at all - in either country), and no S.I.N. The CRA made me pay back the portion of my GST credit I'd already received, as they "could not determine" my wife's world income. I just paid it back, and swallowed it.

2009 Tax Return: My wife, new S.I.N. in hand, filed in Canada for the first time. We reported all her income, honestly, on both our returns. Now the CRA and the Ontario government is requesting proof of her world income, or I/we won't be eligible for GST/HST credits and I'll have to repay nearly $400 I've already received.


So how do I go about proving to the satisfaction of the government that my wife has had no world income since 2007? (It would have been nice if they'd just trusted our returns.)

I have a copy of her last U.S. tax return from 2007, which her mother e-mailed to us. But I'm not sure how that proves she's had no U.S. income since then. Is there something we can request from the IRS listing her last several returns, or something? And I could photocopy her passport, visitor's extensions, etc.--but again, that only (possibly) proves that she wasn't living in the U.S. during 2008 or 2009--not that she had no income.

As always, your help is appreciated beyond measure. Thank you so much.

It's stupid huh? It's kind of a duh thing, how do you prove you made no money, theres no record of it? lol

In the same boat in BC. They sent a bill after she got the rebate. It seems like there should be some logical way to do it. Still waiting to find out... But they had us send a thing signed and stating our incomes...

Now for Pharmacare they had a handy document to fill out and get notarized. It seems like there should be something similar in place for the rebates. =/

Thanks for your reply, mephista.

I just wrote them a letter and included a signed statement from my wife regarding her immigration timeline and incomes, world and domestic, since we've been married. No idea whether that will be enough, but it's a start. I browsed around and found some tax forms re: world income, but they're only for those who aren't residents.

Not sure what else we can do. File U.S. tax returns for the years she's been in Canada, stating no income? And forward the IRS's response to the CRA? Don't really want to have to do that, but that's all I can think of.

We just went to the CRA office and they asked me if I had any income during the time frame they wanted, I said no, they wrote down no income, had me sign and date it, and that was last I ever heard of that again.