The Department of Finance released draft legislation on Thursday for the previously announced deadline extension for charitable donations that doesn’t include in-kind donations of securities.<\/p>\n
In December, Finance extended the deadline<\/a> for making charitable donations for the 2024 tax year to Feb. 28, 2025, given the disruption the Canada Post strike had on charities’ fundraising campaigns. The deadline had been Dec. 31, 2024, to receive a tax receipt for 2024.<\/p>\n The draft legislation confirms that the donation can be in cash or “transferred by way of cheque, credit card, money order or electronic payment.” The gift can\u2019t be made through a payroll deduction or by an individual\u2019s will, if the individual died after 2024.<\/p>\n “I wasn’t surprised when I saw it didn’t include donations in kind,” said John Oakey, CPA Canada\u2019s vice-president of taxation, in an interview. The draft legislation is similar to when the donation deadline was extended after the December 2004 tsunami in Southeast Asia, he said.<\/p>\n Overall, “this is a fairly routine announcement,” Oakey said of Thursday’s draft legislation. “It’s very specific with what [Finance was] trying to accomplish [and] consistent with what they’ve done in the past.”<\/p>\n He added he was surprised Finance took so long \u2014 about three and a half weeks \u2014 to provide the clarification. (The proposed legislation is very short.)<\/p>\n Any donations made up to Feb. 28, 2025, and not claimed on 2024 personal income returns can still be claimed on 2025 returns or carried forward, a CRA release said.<\/p>\n To take advantage of the extended deadline, graduated rate estates (GREs) and corporations must have taxation years that ended after Nov. 14, 2024,<\/span>\u00a0and before\u00a0Jan. 1, 2025. That’s because the postal strike began on Nov. 15, Oakey said.<\/span><\/p>\n GREs and corporations that don’t deduct donations on their returns can deduct the donations on their 2025 returns or carry the amounts forward.<\/p>\n In a release accompanying the draft legislation, the government added to recent tax-filing uncertainty.<\/p>\n “To help provide certainty as we head into tax season, the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) is confirming that it will proceed with administering the 2024 deadline extension for charitable donations,” a CRA release said<\/a>. “The CRA is administering this proposed legislation, consistent with its long-standing<\/span> practice.”<\/p>\n Oakey said the reference to the agency’s “long-standing practice” generated confusion, given the extended deadline for donations isn’t in a notice of ways and means motion, as are the proposed capital gains changes.<\/p>\n