{"id":5958,"date":"2026-04-15T09:28:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T09:28:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/5958\/"},"modified":"2026-04-15T09:28:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T09:28:11","slug":"investment-industry-asks-ottawa-for-more-time-on-gst-and-trailer-fees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/5958\/","title":{"rendered":"Investment industry asks Ottawa for more time on GST and trailer fees"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Industry groups are asking the CRA for more time to implement changes that will require them to collect and remit GST\/HST on trailer fees.Sean Kilpatrick\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

Wealth management industry groups are calling on the federal government to give investment fund companies, dealers and independent advisors more time to implement changes to GST on mutual fund trailing commissions. <\/p>\n

They say the industry will be challenged to have systems in place to charge and remit GST by the Canada Revenue Agency\u2019s (CRA) July 1 implementation date. <\/p>\n

Earlier this year, the CRA confirmed trailing commissions would be subject to GST\/HST<\/a>, reversing its longstanding position on the issue. Dealers and independent advisors<\/a> will have to collect and remit GST\/HST.<\/p>\n

The CRA first signalled the policy change in a letter to the Securities and Investment Management Association (SIMA) in December.<\/p>\n

Now, SIMA is advocating \u201cfor a more realistic, phased implementation approach,\u201d said Christine Harminc, director of communications and public affairs with SIMA, in a response sent by e-mail to questions from The Globe and Mail.<\/p>\n

The group has submitted a proposed implementation timeline to both the Department of Finance and the CRA based on members\u2019 input and has been engaging directly with government officials on the issue, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSIMA\u2019s focus has been on ensuring that any approach is workable in practice, minimizes unintended consequences and reflects the complexity of the current operating environment,\u201d Ms. Harminc said.<\/p>\n

Several industry players say it will be difficult to meet the CRA\u2019s implementation date. <\/p>\n

Peter Bowen, vice-president of tax and retirement research at Fidelity Investments Canada ULC, said in an e-mail to The Globe that \u201cmany dealers and advisors will struggle to be ready by July, which is why the industry, including representation from Fidelity, is meeting with the government to try to get the implementation significantly deferred.\u201d<\/p>\n

Matthew Latimer, executive director of the Federation of Independent Dealers, said his organization is calling on the government to extend the implementation deadline by at least a year \u201cto bring this giant project to fruition successfully\u201d and to provide the industry with more information about the change.<\/p>\n

In a response sent by e-mail to questions from The Globe, CRA spokesperson Nina Ioussoupova said, \u201cNo changes are planned, at this time, for the implementation date related to the application of GST\/HST to trailing commissions. If a decision is made to change the implementation date, the [CRA] will communicate this information in a timely manner.\u201d <\/p>\n

Meanwhile, firms are taking steps to prepare for the change.<\/p>\n

Jason Bobee, president of Portfolio Strategies Corp. in Toronto, says his firm is working with fund companies, intermediary FundServ Inc. and SIMA on back-office system changes to allow for the tracking of GST\/HST and the division of those payments with advisors.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt may take more time to integrate these flows [of data] as a starting point than what CRA expects or wants,\u201d said Mr. Bobee in an e-mail to The Globe. \u201cUltimately, once this is completed, advisors will need to register for GST\/HST numbers.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, until the industry receives greater clarity on the change, \u201cwe are in a holding pattern,\u201d Mr. Bobee said. <\/p>\n

Nelson Cheng, chief executive officer of Sterling Mutuals Inc. in Windsor, Ont., said the CRA is \u201casking the industry to change a long-established practice and it is going to be disruptive.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr. Cheng said his firm will advise all its advisors to register to collect and remit GST as the July deadline draws closer. While a \u201chandful\u201d of advisors are already registered, \u201cwe have never had a reason to keep track of that [before].\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Industry groups are asking the CRA for more time to implement changes that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5959,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[136,3556,484,61],"class_list":{"0":"post-5958","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ottawa","8":"tag-appwebview","9":"tag-globe-advisor","10":"tag-noastack","11":"tag-ottawa"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5958","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5958"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5958\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5959"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5958"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5958"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5958"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}