Preparing for what promises to be an extraordinarily busy tax season, the federal government is taking the unusual step of hiring a private company to answer some Canadians’ questions about pandemic benefits — a move that has one union warning about privacy concerns.
Officials with the Canada Revenue Agency insist this is a short-term initiative and that employees of the private company will only answer general questions and won’t have access to taxpayers’ personal information.
“It’s nice to say that,” said Marc Brière, president of the Union of Taxation Employees, which represents more than 28,000 CRA workers.
“I understand that these people might not have access to the employee CRA system. But what if a taxpayer, thinking they’re calling CRA, inadvertently gave confidential information to the employees of the third party? That can certainly happen. So we’re concerned with that.”
Brière said he also fears that involving a third party will create more confusion for taxpayers who are increasingly being targeted by scam artists claiming to represent the federal government.
The CRA said the company taking on the benefit inquiries is Maximus Canada and that all agents answering the calls will be based in Canada.
On its website, Maximus Canada states that it already provides health administration services in 10 of 13 Canadian provinces and territories. It’s part of a larger global firm that operates in the United States, Australia, Italy, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Korea, Sweden and the United Kingdom and generates about $2.5 billion US in revenue worldwide.
New staffers to be trained on CRA materials, procedures
The private sector staffers will be trained with Canada Revenue Agency materials and procedures but will have to refer account-specific questions to the agency’s in-house agents, CRA said.
“They will only respond to general inquiries from Canadians, and do not have any access to their personal information or CRA accounts,” said a CRA spokesperson.
It’s not clear how many people are being hired to handle the benefit questions. The CRA said the government has set an “expected service level” and Maxiumus will decide how many people it needs to meet that standard.
The contract is set to run from February to August.
“There will be no options to extend the period of the contract,” said a CRA spokesperson.
Brière said he’s been told by CRA officials that the company could hire roughly 130 people.
“We don’t think it’s respectful to our members that worked like crazy to help out the population and now they’re being told those jobs will be given to somebody else. We don’t think that’s appropriate,” he said.
Pandemic benefits complicate tax season
Those private sector staffers would be in addition to the roughly 2,000 new employees CRA is hiring the to deal with what the agency has said will be “a tax season like no other” in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Many Canadians and businesses have accessed newly-created pandemic benefits, which could complicate tax season.
WATCH | How the pandemic changes 2020 tax returns:
The COVID-19 pandemic had a big impact on many Canadians’ bottom line and that will result in changes for tax returns, including a work-from-home credit and paying tax on the CERB. Businesses are hoping the government will provide additional support for them and an extension to the filing deadline. 2:03
It’s not clear, for example, how many of the approximately 8.9 million applicants for the Canada Emergency Response Benefit realized the $2,000 per month payments are taxable and set aside money to pay those taxes.
The CRA said it has been “aggressively hiring” in-house call agents to help address the many tax questions it anticipates. It said that, by March 2021, it expects to have hired and trained about 2,000 new agents who will be able to address Canadians’ questions about their tax filings.
Call centre hours for individual inquiries will also be extended as of Feb. 27 and the agency is adding a new call-back service it said will allow callers to ask for an automated return call “when wait times reach a certain length.”
VANCOUVER – Contract negotiations resume today in Vancouver in a labour dispute that has paralyzed container cargo shipping at British Columbia’s ports since Monday.
The BC Maritime Employers Association and International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 514 are scheduled to meet for the next three days in mediated talks to try to break a deadlock in negotiations.
The union, which represents more than 700 longshore supervisors at ports, including Vancouver, Prince Rupert and Nanaimo, has been without a contract since March last year.
The latest talks come after employers locked out workers in response to what it said was “strike activity” by union members.
The start of the lockout was then followed by several days of no engagement between the two parties, prompting federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon to speak with leaders on both sides, asking them to restart talks.
MacKinnon had said that the talks were “progressing at an insufficient pace, indicating a concerning absence of urgency from the parties involved” — a sentiment echoed by several business groups across Canada.
In a joint letter, more than 100 organizations, including the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, Business Council of Canada and associations representing industries from automotive and fertilizer to retail and mining, urged the government to do whatever it takes to end the work stoppage.
“While we acknowledge efforts to continue with mediation, parties have not been able to come to a negotiated agreement,” the letter says. “So, the federal government must take decisive action, using every tool at its disposal to resolve this dispute and limit the damage caused by this disruption.
“We simply cannot afford to once again put Canadian businesses at risk, which in turn puts Canadian livelihoods at risk.”
In the meantime, the union says it has filed a complaint to the Canada Industrial Relations Board against the employers, alleging the association threatened to pull existing conditions out of the last contract in direct contact with its members.
“The BCMEA is trying to undermine the union by attempting to turn members against its democratically elected leadership and bargaining committee — despite the fact that the BCMEA knows full well we received a 96 per cent mandate to take job action if needed,” union president Frank Morena said in a statement.
The employers have responded by calling the complaint “another meritless claim,” adding the final offer to the union that includes a 19.2 per cent wage increase over a four-year term remains on the table.
“The final offer has been on the table for over a week and represents a fair and balanced proposal for employees, and if accepted would end this dispute,” the employers’ statement says. “The offer does not require any concessions from the union.”
The union says the offer does not address the key issue of staffing requirement at the terminals as the port introduces more automation to cargo loading and unloading, which could potentially require fewer workers to operate than older systems.
The Port of Vancouver is the largest in Canada and has seen a number of labour disruptions, including two instances involving the rail and grain storage sectors earlier this year.
A 13-day strike by another group of workers at the port last year resulted in the disruption of a significant amount of shipping and trade.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
The Royal Canadian Legion says a new partnership with e-commerce giant Amazon is helping boost its veterans’ fund, and will hopefully expand its donor base in the digital world.
Since the Oct. 25 launch of its Amazon.ca storefront, the legion says it has received nearly 10,000 orders for poppies.
Online shoppers can order lapel poppies on Amazon in exchange for donations or buy items such as “We Remember” lawn signs, Remembrance Day pins and other accessories, with all proceeds going to the legion’s Poppy Trust Fund for Canadian veterans and their families.
Nujma Bond, the legion’s national spokesperson, said the organization sees this move as keeping up with modern purchasing habits.
“As the world around us evolves we have been looking at different ways to distribute poppies and to make it easier for people to access them,” she said in an interview.
“This is definitely a way to reach a wider number of Canadians of all ages. And certainly younger Canadians are much more active on the web, on social media in general, so we’re also engaging in that way.”
Al Plume, a member of a legion branch in Trenton, Ont., said the online store can also help with outreach to veterans who are far from home.
“For veterans that are overseas and are away, (or) can’t get to a store they can order them online, it’s Amazon.” Plume said.
Plume spent 35 years in the military with the Royal Engineers, and retired eight years ago. He said making sure veterans are looked after is his passion.
“I’ve seen the struggles that our veterans have had with Veterans Affairs … and that’s why I got involved, with making sure that the people get to them and help the veterans with their paperwork.”
But the message about the Amazon storefront didn’t appear to reach all of the legion’s locations, with volunteers at Branch 179 on Vancouver’s Commercial Drive saying they hadn’t heard about the online push.
Holly Paddon, the branch’s poppy campaign co-ordinator and bartender, said the Amazon partnership never came up in meetings with other legion volunteers and officials.
“I work at the legion, I work with the Vancouver poppy office and I go to the meetings for the Vancouver poppy campaign — which includes all the legions in Vancouver — and not once has this been mentioned,” she said.
Paddon said the initiative is a great idea, but she would like to have known more about it.
The legion also sells a larger collection of items at poppystore.ca.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
