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Canada seeks to end Uber's tax advantage over taxi companies

reuters.com

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Re: Canada seeks to end Uber's tax advantage over taxi companies

#41

Post by vkou »

stormbrew wrote: post #36
vkou wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I staff my grocery store with contractors, can I claim a $30,000/contractor tax exemption too? The intent of the law is pretty clear - serious businesses (That do more then $30,000/year in sales) are expected to pay taxes. Small ones are not - because of the small amount of tax revenue, and the high burden of compliance for individuals. The cost of compliance for Uber is trivial. It's a bloody app, for Pete's sake…

Can your grocery store contractors come in whenever they want, wear whatever they want, use whatever till software they want?

Sure, but I'll only pay them for the minutes when they are checking out a customer.

Re: Canada seeks to end Uber's tax advantage over taxi companies

#42

Post by kazinator »

vkou wrote: post #7

The fact that they weren't paying GST is mind-boggling. The purpose of the exemption is to let someone running a tiny hobby business sell their products without having to deal with tax headaches. The purpose of the exemption was never to let a mega-corporation take the exemption of each employee, multiply it by the number of employees, and pretend that they don't need to pay tax. What next? A grocery store taking the…

Yes, in fact that is how it works. If multiple independent contractors work for some firm, they each get their 30,000 exemption (if eligible) as individual sole proprietors of their individual businesses. They have their own business numbers and GST accounts which are considered individually.

Contractors are considered employees in some ways and not in others. This is mainly under labor ("labour", here in Canada) law which is there to protect workers from being exploited by being reclassified as contractors. Like you can't ask people to work in shit conditions just because they are contractors, and such, or deny them a lunch break.

Re: Canada seeks to end Uber's tax advantage over taxi companies

#43

Post by Andys »

thrill wrote: post #15
vkou wrote: post #7

The fact that they weren't paying GST is mind-boggling. The purpose of the exemption is to let someone running a tiny hobby business sell their products without having to deal with tax headaches. The purpose of the exemption was never to let a mega-corporation take the exemption of each employee, multiply it by the number of employees, and pretend that they don't need to pay tax. What next? A grocery store taking the…

Uber drivers are not employees. They are independent contractors. Uber, as part of their service, collects money from riders, giving both the rider and the driver a comfort factor as they don't have to deal with cash. As "hobby" businesses they each individually were enjoying the exemption. Now they will not - because we can't have "hobby" businesses causing discomfort to the well connected.

Australia has laws about this: eg. If you do >80% of your work for one company, you are an employee for all tax/employment law purposes.

Re: Canada seeks to end Uber's tax advantage over taxi companies

#44

Post by scosman »

vkou wrote: post #19
thrill wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uber drivers are not employees. They are independent contractors. Uber, as part of their service, collects money from riders, giving both the rider and the driver a comfort factor as they don't have to deal with cash. As "hobby" businesses they each individually were enjoying the exemption. Now they will not - because we can't have "hobby" businesses causing discomfort to the well connected.

If I staff my grocery store with contractors, can I claim a $30,000/contractor tax exemption too? The intent of the law is pretty clear - serious businesses (That do more then $30,000/year in sales) are expected to pay taxes. Small ones are not - because of the small amount of tax revenue, and the high burden of compliance for individuals. The cost of compliance for Uber is trivial. It's a bloody app, for Pete's sake…

They already support collecting HST (drivers who make more than $30k have to). Occasionally I take a ride and see HST on the receipt, but most are dodging it.

Re: Canada seeks to end Uber's tax advantage over taxi companies

#45

Post by problems »

MattRix wrote: post #28
thrill wrote: post #25

The new national budget unveiled Wednesday by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's Liberal government took aim at document processor providers such as Microsoft Word [MSFT], to force them to collect the goods and services tax (GST) on every document created using their software. Trudeau stated, "(The Royal) we are quite disappointed that many attorneys and other value-added providers within Canada are creating do…

Now imagine that Microsoft Word was being used to do the selling and payment processing of those documents and it starts to make more sense...

Uber is essentially just a matcher and payment processor that takes a cut, they don't own vehicles or employ drivers - will they only have to pay taxes on their cut?

Re: Canada seeks to end Uber's tax advantage over taxi companies

#46

Post by boona »

peeters wrote: post #33
thrill wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uber drivers are not employees. They are independent contractors. Uber, as part of their service, collects money from riders, giving both the rider and the driver a comfort factor as they don't have to deal with cash. As "hobby" businesses they each individually were enjoying the exemption. Now they will not - because we can't have "hobby" businesses causing discomfort to the well connected.

If it quacks like a duck, it gets taxed like a duck. Uber has made a business out of exploiting legal loopholes. They know it, their users know it, the politicians know it. It's just been a race to close them. I have no sympathy for Uber in this. They obviously provide a valuable service to people, so I'm sure they'll survive. Now they'll just be competing on an even playing field.

>Uber has made a business out of exploiting legal loopholes.

I find that kind of argumentation silly. They brought to the taxi industry, what is common in other industries, like construction, tech, etc. Stated differently, Uber has been able to provide a competitive service by legally structuring themselves in a way maximizes return for the themselves, for the driver, but still keeps costs low client due to say structuring.

Re: Canada seeks to end Uber's tax advantage over taxi companies

#47

Post by kazinator »

Svexark wrote: post #26
BillyParadise wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed re. contractors. When you use the Uber app, you pay Uber. Not Joe Shmoe and his nice newish car. Therefore the HST should be payable, to Uber. In turn, drivers who earn > $30k should provide their HST number to Uber, and Uber should be billed HST in remittances. In turn, drivers can write off HST paid on all business-related expenses. Yay, Value Added Taxes.

When I buy a book from Amazon, I pay Amazon, not the seller. Therefore, the seller is an employee of Amazon.

Right, so if you buy a book from Amazon, and then pay your credit card bill a month-something later, that means Amazon and the seller are employees of Visa. Wherever the end-user sends money is the employer; that's it.

Re: Canada seeks to end Uber's tax advantage over taxi companies

#48

Post by Anderkent »

ribosometronome wrote: post #35
Svexark wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I buy a book from Amazon, I pay Amazon, not the seller. Therefore, the seller is an employee of Amazon.

When you buy a book from a seller on Amazon, who sets the price?

Very often Amazon

Re: Canada seeks to end Uber's tax advantage over taxi companies

#49

Post by kazinator »

stormbrew wrote: post #36
vkou wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I staff my grocery store with contractors, can I claim a $30,000/contractor tax exemption too? The intent of the law is pretty clear - serious businesses (That do more then $30,000/year in sales) are expected to pay taxes. Small ones are not - because of the small amount of tax revenue, and the high burden of compliance for individuals. The cost of compliance for Uber is trivial. It's a bloody app, for Pete's sake…

Can your grocery store contractors come in whenever they want, wear whatever they want, use whatever till software they want?

Can a building contractor wear whatever they want, like a ball cap instead of a hard hat and sneakers instead of steel toe boots?

Can a software contractor code in any programming language and on and operating system, whether or not the client uses them? Can he or she flout the HR policies, while on site?

Re: Canada seeks to end Uber's tax advantage over taxi companies

#50

Post by a3camero »

tensor wrote: post #27
flamedoge wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need a Canadian Taxi hailing app. We can make it.

You mean like this? http://www.itbusiness.ca/news/canadian-alternative-to-uber-l... Sadly it doesn't address any of the problems with cabs in Toronto. 1. Cabs won't take credit cards by claiming "the machine is broken" when it's not, presumably so that they can avoid reporting tips or fees, or they might just skim your card. 2. Cabs are too expensive. 3. Cabs might not even take you if they figure the ride isn't wort…

Cabs also often don't give receipts with HST numbers on them. So presumably they're not reporting the HST they may or may not be collecting too.
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