Remember Brian Mulroney: The Voluntary Disclosure Program allows taxpayers to correct previous tax returns if they have failed to report income. Mr. Mulroney used this program to disclose unreported income.
Don’t wait: If the Canada Revenue Agency has already initiated action against you, it is too late to use the Voluntary Disclosure program. You have to inform the CRA first.
Tax time can get confusing with all the various tax slips you get from your bank. It is sometimes hard to keep track of them all. You might be wondering what tax slips you should be expecting in the mail if you have an RRSP, before efiling online for the year.
1. Contribution Receipts – You will only get receipts if you made contributions.
If you made any contributions during 2010 or during the first 60 days of 2011, you will receive one or more contribution receipts from your financial institution. You would have already received the first 60 days of 2010 receipt in the spring of 2010 and you may have already claimed this on your 2009 taxes. However, you will want to watch out for the remainder of 2010 receipt (March 2nd to December 31st) as well as for the first 60 days of 2011 receipt (Jan 1st to March 1st).
J.K. Lasser’s Your Income Tax 2011: For Preparing Your 2010 Tax Return
Whether you do your own taxes or you hire an accountant, if you are an American, you will benefit from reading J.K Lasser’s income tax book. It provides you with all kinds of tips that will ensure you are filing your taxes properly and maximizing your tax savings. Even if you have an accountant do your taxes, it is still important for you to understand any tax credits or deductions that you are entitled to. It is in your best interest to make sure you are taking advantage of everything available to you..
The book is an easy to read, comprehensive guide that will walk you through the tax process, outlining information on the various tax forms, and much more. After skimming this book, you will be well equipped to tackle your taxes. While doing your taxes, if you come across something that is unclear that requires clarification, you can be sure you will find the answer in this guidebook.
Use J.K. Lasser’s book as a reference while you prepare your taxes to ensure that it goes as smoothly as possible. Since we are not all tax accountants, it is nice to know that there is a well written and easy to understand guidebook that can walk you through the process and make it less painful.
Check out this book today. You will not be disappointed. There is information in this book that will be helpful to anyone who has to file taxes in the United States. The book covers a wide range of topics including discussions about IRAs, real estate, life insurance, and so much more.
Canadians pay a lot of income tax and any way that we can find to reduce our tax bill is a major plus. Yahoo! Finance has a really great article titled “Slash Your Taxes” that I would recommend you read before filing your taxes this year.
The majority of the tips discussed in the article focus on how spouses can effectively split their incomes in order to reduce the taxes owing for the highest wage earner. Examples include using a spousal RSP, having the lower wage earner opening sole-owned investments, and lending money to the lower wage earner spouse so they can invest.
