Entrepreneurs seeing red
Bureaucratic bungles cost small business owners big
Red tape week in Canada means roofers like Terry Pepin must scramble to find paperwork to satisfy government authorities — but sometimes the papers don’t exist.
“Our tax dispute with the Canada Revenue Agency could cost us tens of thousands of dollars,” said Pepin, owner of Roofix Services Inc., on Monday.
“We have three days to produce documentation. We’re scrambling,” he said.
Pepin, 66, has been fixing roofs for 36 years, the last 12 of them at his Burnaby company, which employs 25 people.
The taxation dispute centres on what constitutes documentation for an apprentice in B.C.
Companies such as Roofix have been given rebates for apprentices for the past four years but Pepin said authorities called him a week ago to say his documentation was lacking.
They wanted an apprenticeship contract but Pepin said the program is sponsored by the province and the only documentation is a registration form.
The agency has set a deadline for resolution of the file: the company faces loss of its rebates and a fine.
“We don’t seem to be able to make them understand that the contracts don’t exist,” he said.
“Everything was done according to the book, but it appears a couple of chapters were added and nobody knew about it.”
The Canadian Federation of Independent Business has declared this week red-tape awareness week in Canada.
Laura Jones, a CFIB senior vicepresident in Vancouver, said Pepin’s type of trouble occurs all too frequently.
Jones knows of a case where one business owner made seven calls before getting an answer from the Canada Revenue Agency.
On another occasion, 300 plants were destroyed at the border because of a spelling mistake on an import permit.
Red-tape complaints are often directed at taxing authorities in federal, provincial and municipal governments.
But government regulators, safety organizations and environmental agencies all deserve criticism say the 108,000 small businesses that make up the CFIB across Canada.
Officials at the Canada Revenue Agency said they have been working hard to address concerns.
“We’ve been listening to what small businesses have told us and made adjustments,” said agency spokesman Bradley Alvarez in Vancouver.
“For things like apprenticeships, we strike a balance between redtape reduction and maintaining the integrity of the tax system,” he said.
A “Taxpayer Bill of Rights” was introduced in 2007 that listed 15 rights and the agency undertook to provide five service commitments to small businesses. A taxpayers’ ombudsman was introduced in 2008.
There are also programs for problem resolutions and service complaints, he said.