Tax court of Canada | Tax | Goods and Services Tax | Rebates
Homeowner applied for new housing rebate, which Minister denied. Homeowner appealed, claiming Minister did not mail notice of assessment. Minister brought motion to quash appeal, claiming that homeowner failed to object to assessment within time limit. Appeal allowed and motion dismissed. Homeowner was found to be credible witness when she claimed that she had received income tax notice of reassessment and HST notice of assessment but not GST/HST rebate notice. It seemed unlikely that homeowner would have received three notices of assessment related to purchase and sale of condo and only objected to two of them. Manager of print to mail division at CRA gave evidence about how mailing system works. Manager relied on programs officer about business client communications system cycle in which homeowner’s notice of assessment was to be printed, but did not have personal knowledge of which systems cycle contained homeowner’s notice of reassessment and programs officer did not provide affidavit. As result, while it was known that specific system cycles were successfully mailed, it was unknown whether homeowner’s notice of assessment was part of cycle. Minister failed to discharge burden of proving mailing because there was unsatisfactory evidence that notice of assessment was mailed, while there was credible evidence that it was not received.
DaSilva v. The Queen (2018), 2018 CarswellNat 1746, 2018 TCC 74, David E. Graham J. (T.C.C. [Informal Procedure]).
