PRIVACY POLICY

Gordon Ferguson & Associates was founded on principles of knowledge, integrity and accountability. Gordon Ferguson & Associates is committed to client satisfaction. This privacy policy sets forth the types of information we collect, how we may use or disclose that personal information, how we protect your personal information, and your rights regarding your personal information.

Objective & Scope of Privacy Policy

Gordon Ferguson & Associates is committed to providing reliable, timely, and accurate income tax returns to its clients across Canada. Consistent with the Canada Standards Act Privacy code, the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (“PIPEDA”), and other applicable law, Gordon Ferguson & Associates is dedicated to maintaining high standards of confidentiality with respect to the personal information it collects from its clients. This Privacy Policy governs personal information collected from our clients for the purposes of completing and filing income tax returns. It does not cover aggregated data from which the identity of an individual cannot be determined, or information that is available from a public source, such as a telephone directory. This Privacy Policy applies to all Gordon Ferguson & Associates employees and contracted employees. Using contractual or other arrangements, Gordon Ferguson & Associates will ensure agents, contractors and third party service providers, who may receive personal information in the course of providing services to Gordon Ferguson & Associates as part of Gordon Ferguson & Associates’ delivery of services, protect the personal information in a manner consistent with the principles set out in this Privacy Policy. If a question arises regarding access to your personal information held by Gordon Ferguson & Associates, or there is a concern about the manner in which Gordon Ferguson & Associates collects, uses, retains and discloses your personal information as one of Gordon Ferguson & Associates’ clients, please contact:

Arpit Jain, Privacy Officer

Gordon Ferguson & Associates

1755 Division St N

Kingsville, ON N9Y 2Y8

Email: info@gfassociates.net

Phone: 519-733-3387

Definitions

CRA is an acronym and refers to the Canada Revenue Agency.

Consent means voluntary agreement with the collection, use, retention and disclosure of information for the purposes for which Gordon Ferguson & Associates’ services have been retained. Express consent is obtained explicitly, in writing, from the client.

Collection means any and all information obtained from the client for the purpose of providing the income tax return preparation and filing services of Gordon Ferguson & Associates. Collection also means any and all information obtained about the client from other third party sources such as Canada Revenue Agency for the purpose of providing income tax return preparation and filing services. client refers to any individual that has retained Gordon Ferguson & Associates’ services.

Disclosure means making available Personal Information and business information about the client to third party government agencies or organizations outside of Gordon Ferguson & Associates.

Organization is defined as a business, association, partnership, person, or trade union.

Personal Information means any information about the client, recorded in any form that is identifiable to that individual either directly or by inference from the information, but does not include the name, title or address, or other information relating to the client’s business or place of employment.

Transfer means filing or otherwise transferring Personal Information and business information to or from a Gordon Ferguson & Associates location, Gordon Ferguson & Associates head office, or Canada Revenue Agency for the purposes consented to by the client.

Use means the tabulation of all information obtained from the client and other third party sources, as well as the preparation of all pertinent and relevant income tax and benefit reporting and filing all related and pertinent forms as required by Canada Revenue Agency (“Return”).

Collection, Use & Transfer of Personal Information

Purpose: The purpose for the collection, use, and transfer of a client’s Personal Information by Gordon Ferguson & Associates, its employees, and contracted employees, is to obtain all pertinent and necessary information for the preparation and filing of the client’s Return as required by CRA pursuant to the Income Tax Act.

Collection: Personal Information will be collected, to the extent possible, directly from the client. Where Personal Information is not available from the client, but may be obtained from a financial institution, government agency, or other third party source, Personal Information will be collected from those sources with the client’s consent. Personal Information that is collected by, and about, the client is limited to only that information that is required by CRA and the Income Tax Act for the preparation and filing of the client’s Return.

Use & Transfer: Personal Information that is collected in the preparation of a client’s Return may be transferred to Gordon Ferguson & Associates’ head office or any other Gordon Ferguson & Associates location for final review for processing prior to electronic transfer to CRA. Personal Information is not otherwise used or disclosed to any third party organizations for any reason outside the purpose stipulated above. Any data that is aggregated for statistical or business monitoring purposes will be rendered anonymous so as not to be identifiable to the client.

Consent

When a client signs the Information Return for Electronic Filing of an Individual’s Income Tax and Benefit Return, and signs the client Authorization form, the client consents and agrees to the following:

Accuracy

Gordon Ferguson & Associates endeavors to ensure that any Personal Information provided by its clients, and in its possession, is accurate, current and complete as is necessary for the purposes for which the Personal Information is used and transferred. Upon notification by a client that the Personal Information collected and used by Gordon Ferguson & Associates requires correction or updating, Gordon Ferguson & Associates will endeavor to make the necessary corrections promptly. Personal Information contained in files that have been closed, or from prior year income tax returns, is not actively updated or maintained.

Retention

Gordon Ferguson & Associates retains Personal Information as long as Gordon Ferguson & Associates believes it is required to retain such information for the purpose of filing completed Returns and having such Returns available in the event that such information is required by client to respond to a request by CRA. After a client’s Return has been filed with CRA, the said Return and all Personal Information contained therein is stored at the Gordon Ferguson & Associates site where the Return was prepared or at Gordon Ferguson & Associates’ main database to enable Gordon Ferguson & Associates to respond to any inquiries from client or CRA and for no other purpose. This information is usually stored for a period of seven years.

Access to Personal Information

Gordon Ferguson & Associates permits a client to access and review the Personal Information it holds about the client upon receipt of a written request to the Privacy Officer. Where Personal Information will not or cannot be disclosed, the client making the request will be provided with reasons for the non-disclosure. To protect against fraudulent requests for access, Gordon Ferguson & Associates will require sufficient information or proof of identification from the client before granting access or making corrections to the client’s Personal Information. Where a request for access to a client’s Personal Information is granted, Gordon Ferguson & Associates will endeavor to provide the information in question within a reasonable time and no later than 30 days following receipt of the written request and confirmation of the client’s identity. Gordon Ferguson & Associates may charge a nominal cost to the client making the access request to cover photocopying or mailing costs, if necessary.

Amendment to Gordon Ferguson & Associates Privacy Policy and Procedure

This Privacy Policy is in effect as of January 1, 2014. Gordon Ferguson & Associates recognizes that legal interpretation of PIPEDA and future Provincial privacy legislation may impact its privacy policies and procedures. The Privacy Officer will review and revise this Privacy Policy from time to time, and notification of any revisions will be posted on Gordon Ferguson & Associates’ Internet web site, as well as communicated to Gordon Ferguson & Associates’ locations. Privacy Policy changes will apply to the Personal Information collected from the date of posting of the revised Policy Statement to Gordon Ferguson & Associates' Internet web site.

Complaint Process

Any concern or complaint by a client about a Gordon Ferguson & Associates location’s or employee’s management of the client’s Personal Information should be directed to the Privacy Officer, in writing. All complaints received by the Privacy Officer will be investigated promptly and the client will be advised of the results of the investigation. Where corrective or disciplinary action is indicated by the Privacy Officer’s investigation, Gordon Ferguson & Associates will undertake to take such corrective and/or disciplinary action promptly.

RELEASE OF INFORMATION TO ELECTIONS CANADA

Elections Canada will use the information you provide to update the National Register of Electors, the database of Canadian citizens qualified to vote in federal elections, by-elections and referendums, or the Register of Future Electors, if you are aged 14 to 17. The Register of Future Electors allows young Canadian citizens aged 14 to 17 to register before turning 18; once they turn 18 and their eligibility is confirmed, they are added to the National Register of Electors. Other uses of the information permitted under the Canada Elections Act include providing voter information to provincial and territorial electoral agencies for uses permitted under their respective legislations and providing voter information (not including birth dates) to members of Parliament, registered and eligible political parties and candidates at election time. Only persons who have Canadian citizenship and are 18 years of age or older are qualified to vote. Generally, you are a Canadian citizen either by birth or if you have obtained Canadian citizenship through the formal process of becoming a Canadian citizen (naturalization). If you are a Canadian citizen and are 18 and over, you will not lose your right to vote, regardless of your answer to question. The CRA does not use this information for the purpose of processing your return.

DISPOSING OF YOUR PRINCIPAL RESIDENCE

When you sell your home or when you are considered to have sold it, usually you do not have to pay tax on any gain from the sale because of the principal residence exemption. This is the case if the property was solely your principal residence for every year you owned it.

Reporting the sale of your principal residence

If you sold your property and it was your principal residence you have to report the sale and designate the property on Schedule 3, Capital Gains (or Losses). In addition, you also have to complete Form T2091(IND), Designation of a Property as a Principal Residence by an Individual (Other Than a Personal Trust).

Why you have to report the sale

For the sale of a principal residence in 2016 and subsequent years, the CRA will only allow the principal residence exemption if you report the disposition and designation of your principal residence on your income tax and benefit return. If you forget to make this designation in the year of the disposition, it is very important to ask the CRA to amend your income tax return for that year. The CRA will be able to accept a late designation in certain circumstances, but a penalty may apply.

Note

For dispositions that occur after October 2, 2016, for a taxpayer to be eligible for the "plus 1" rule, the taxpayer must be resident in Canada during the year the principal residence is purchased. Therefore, if a taxpayer is non-resident throughout the taxation year in which the property was purchased, the taxpayer will not be eligible for the extra year in calculating the principal residence exemption amount.

If your home was not your principal residence for every year that you owned it, you have to report the part of the capital gain on the property that relates to the years for which you did not designate the property as your principal residence.

Because your home is considered personal-use property, if you have a loss at the time you sell or are considered to have sold your home, you are not allowed to claim the loss.

If only a part of your home qualifies as your principal residence and you used the other part to earn or produce income, you have to split the selling price and the adjusted cost base between the part you used for your principal residence and the part you used for other purposes (for example, rental or business). You can do this by using square metres or the number of rooms, as long as the split is reasonable.

The CRA will consider the entire property to maintain its nature as a principal residence in spite of the fact that you have used it for income producing purposes when all of the following conditions are met:

· The income producing use is ancillary to the main use of the property as a residence.

· There is no structural change to the property.

· No capital cost allowance is claimed on the property.

If you sold more than one property in the same calendar year and each property was, at one time, your principal residence, you must show this by completing a separate Form T2091(IND) for each property to designate what years each was your principal residence and to calculate the amount of capital gain, if any, to report.

FOREIGN PROPERTY REPORTING

The Foreign Property reporting rules require completion of an information statement that reports foreign property owned by Canadian residents at any time in the year. The statement must be completed if you owned or held a beneficial interest in “specified foreign property” with an aggregate cost in excess of $100,000 CAD.

Specified foreign property includes:

1. Funds held outside of Canada e.g., offshore bank account;

2. Tangible property situated outside Canada;

3. A share of a non-resident corporation (for example, Apple Inc. owned in a Canadian investment account);

4. An interest in a non-resident trust;

5. An interest in a partnership holding foreign property;

6. An interest or right with respect to a non-resident entity;

7. Indebtedness owed by a non-resident person;

8. Property which can be converted or exchanged into foreign property.

Excluded are:

1. Property used in carrying on an active business;

2. Shares of a non-resident corporation that is a foreign affiliate;

3. An interest in a non-resident trust acquired for no consideration;

4. Certain partnerships;

5. Personal use property such as a vacation property.

6. Mutual funds registered in Canada that contain foreign investments.

Substantial penalties exist for non-compliance.

The required forms must be filed by April 30 following the taxation calendar year.