Question re: Canada Revenue, Residency, and Taxes

[twobelowpar]

Note: I may have put this in the wrong forum at first. Apologies.

Anyway, hi all, I hope this isn't too confusing. I don't think it will be. My wife moved here from the States in May 2010 and became a permanent resident in Feb 14, 2011 (yay!). We both filed income taxes for 2010. Because she was a student for part of the year and had 0 income I was able to get a greater return. Now we are getting a letter from the Ontario Sales Tax Transition Benefit asking for her 2009 income (because 2010 payments were based on 2009 income and now they know I'm married so they want to make sure we didn't get more than I'm entitled to). Not a big deal, we have her American returns from that year. But no they tell us (her) to fill in a RC66SCH form instead. The part that scares me is that it says "Enter the date you became a resident of Canada" as well as "If you or your spouse was a permanent resident, a protected person, or a temporary resident, enter the start dates in the areas below to cover the entire period for which you are applying for benefits."
As far as I'm concerned she has been living here since May 2010. Officially it may not have been until February 2011 but I am worried that if I put Feb 2011 as a date that they will claw back part of my refund if they don't think she should have filed her 2010 income taxes. Does this make sense and do I have anything to worry about? The form is here and the section concerning me is A and C: http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/E/pbg/tf/rc66sch/rc66sch-10e.pdf

Thank you kindly.

 

[Jonboy]

Don't forget that "resident" for tax purposes is not the same as "permanent resident" for immigration purposes. I don't see a problem with saying she became resident (for tax purposes) in May 2010 and a permanent resident in Feb 2011.

 

[toby]

Don't forget that "resident" for tax purposes is not the same as "permanent resident" for immigration purposes. I don't see a problem with saying she became resident (for tax purposes) in May 2010 and a permanent resident in Feb 2011.

In cases like these I would explain my thinkingin a covr letter. That way if you are wrong CRA can easily correct the tax return. And in the future CRA cannot claim that you tried to deceive them.

I hope I am being overcautious, too suspicious of CRA, but in my past life in Canada (financial planner, often privy to clients' tax-return reassessments) I've seen some rather obnoxious, quarrelsome auditors look for pretexts to award penalties.