Relinquishment and Renunciation Data (as reported on Isaac Brock), Part 2
US RELINQUISHMENT RENUNCIATION.m2
Above is a link to data we are compiling on Relinquishments and Renunciations — a work in progress.
(We are starting Part 2 as Part 1 has now over 1,000 comments.) Link to “Relinquishment and Renunciation Data (as reported on Isaac Brock), Part 1”
This Relinquishment and Renunciation database corresponds with the Consulate Report Directory, which tracks individual experiences for each Consulate, along with a timeline chart.
Note: We are using numbers instead of blog names for this public posting so there will be no compromise of private information. Your facts will help give a snapshot of relinquishment and renunciation activity and where that occurs.
Please submit information in the comments below (or someone can contact you privately if you leave a message).
This database and the Consulate Report Directory have proven valuable resources for those new to the subject of relinquishment and renunciation. They can see numbers for and read others’ experiences of relinquishment or renunciation at various US consulates throughout the world — as reported by participants of the Isaac Brock site.
Thanks for your addition to the Relinquishment and Renunciation database. Your input will definitely help others.
Thank you, mettleman. It was a hard thing to do, putting myself and family in harm’s way by ‘coming out’. I felt I was untrue to myself and could perhaps be a help to others in similar situation as my family, although I’d never advise them to do what I did. There seemed to be much awareness in CBC coverage started by the interviews Gwen and I had with the CBC. I am glad of that — and, yes, we must continue to fight the fight.
Very confused. They can’t go after your husband’s investments. They can’t even ‘go after’ your accounts. There is a great deal of fear mongering on the internet and elsewhere. Canadian accounts under 50k will be exempt from FATCA reporting. Registered accounts including RESPs and RRSPs will be exempt. Unless you have an account >1 million $, the bank will not know where you were born and won’t ask.
The US won’t know or care about you unless you tell them to come and get you.
I believe it was badger who at one time produced a piece of information where the IRS said that should a taxpayer share an account with a non-US person, all accounts belonging to the non-US person would, whether shared or not, be reportable to the IRS. Yes, I couldn’t believe it either.
Any ideas where I can get a copy of my oath that I would have signed when I got my Canadian citizenship ? I found an online search database on the Canadian immigration website but you have to pay 75$ and I’m not even sure what would come up. I would love to see exactly what I signed.
@very confused
These are widely accepted as facts:
No foreign state – including the US – can collect taxes in Canada. Only the Government of Canada can collect taxes from Canadians in Canada.
No foreign state – including the US – can place liens, seize assets or garnishee wages in Canada.
Canadian courts will not enforce a foreign tax claim against Canadian citizens in Canada.
Only the Canadian Government can assist foreign governments in collecting taxes in Canada, provided there is tax treaty.
Under the Canada-US tax treaty, the government of Canada will not collect US taxes from any Canadian citizen, unless the tax claim predated their date of citizenship.
A modest suggestion:
Do nothing rash. Do not liquidate your assets, mess with your kid’s RESP, etc.
Has ANYONE from the US government sent you a personalized collection letter?
Ask your accountant: how can the US collect taxes from me in Canada? Ask for examples of successful collection of US taxes from long-term Canadian citizens in Canada using Canadian courts (if such examples exist).
If your bank asks “are you a US person?” tell them you are a Canadian. Tell them their question is confusing, since you are a Canadian living in Canada. If they persist ask them if they are inquiring about your national origin for the purpose of unlawful discrimination. Ask them if they also want to know your religion. Ask them to ask you if you are also a Chinese or Italian person. Threaten to lawyer up. If this outrageous invasion of privacy and violation of the Charter comes to actually comes to pass, there will probably be class action lawsuits you can join in.
Things to do: complain relentlessly to your MP and Finance Minister Jim Flaherty. CC the NDP, especially Murray Rankin and Peggy Nash. And the Liberals, especially Ted Hsu, Irwin Colter and Scott Brison. CC the Canadian Civil Liberties Union. Write a letter to the editor. Call a reporter.
This is campaign of fear. There is lot of noise and smoke and fog. The first and best move is to not be provoked into rash action.
@ Skeptical
Very good advice!
Skeptical,
Thanks for your excellent advice to Very Confused — and to others reading here. We have to continually stay in focus. You’re right about the campaign of fear — isn’t that the way the US operates?
May we all memorize well, internalize and use your words:
!!!!!!!!!
@ calgary411
I am printing Skeptical’s words on a card to keep in my wallet. AND I have a war chest started in the event that a class action lawsuit becomes necessary.
Sceptical!!!! Wonderful!!!!! Your comment should be a sticky. So clear. So obvious. So passionate. I wish I had your way with words. We will probably refer back to this post whenever we have a newbie who is scared out of his mind and doesn’t know where to turn.
@skeptical, love your comment! This made me feel so much better…. Class action law suit sounds good to me, I’m in. My investment bank is aware I’m American so it will be interesting what happens.
Don’t worry, I’m not going to make any rash decisions. I almost did last week when I made an appointment to file my taxes for the past 3 years and 6 years of FBARs…. and then stumbled across this wonderful website.
@ Em, KalC
Thanks. The key information missing from much of the advice people receive is the difficulty in collecting any kind of foreign tax claim in Canada. The natural tendency is to assume that the US has the same tax collection tools and authority in Canada that it has in the US. It does not.
All of the fear-mongering articles about “Being On the IRS Hit List” in Canada neglected to mention it’s almost impossible for any foreign government to collect a tax claim in Canada.
Only Don Cayo of the Vancouver Sun actually contacted the Canadian Revenue Agency to get an authoritative opinion: they would not collect a US tax debt from any Canadian citizen.
In every one of their vague and ambiguous replies regarding FATCA, Jim Flaherty’s Department of Finance carefully repeated the fact that Canada will not assist in collecting US tax from any Canadian citizen. Conduct yourselves accordingly.
@ Skeptic(al)
Would you consider making another one of those great comments after listening to this podcast?
http://www.cbc.ca/ontheisland/2014/01/20/how-an-american-tax-law-could-affect-your-bank-account/
The “advice” given by this US tax practitioner really needs an antidote.
@bubblebusting On the joint accounts with non-US persons, the FBAR form asks for that, not the IRS. I gave it to them, but when my tax man did my return last year, he also filled in this form, and I see that he didn’t report it. Why, I don’t know. As I had already filed it, it was moot. They have the information somewhere, but it didn’t go to the IRS (or not directly, and how you take that depends on your particular level of paranoia today). I don’t think this is a gray area, but my interpretation of the form and the professional’s were different. Go figure.
@RevSusi
My experience over 10+ years of professional filers for an extremely well-known US tax-filing chain (yes, that one!) operating in an EU country is that (1) despite my providing correct information, they repeatedly made several different types of mistakes with potentially catastrophic consequences; (2) when I wrote to ask about something that seemed not to make sense, they either insisted they had been right or ignored my question; (3) other firms, members of the International Compliance Complex, are only too happy to charge for checking and correcting these errors. This website has been a much more reliable source of information. Caveat emptor.
@very confused
To get a copy of the citizenship oath you can:
1. Make an access to information/privacy request to Citizenship and Immigration Canada to get a copy of your citizenship file. I asked for both paper and electronic records (two requests). You file should have a copy of your oath.
2. Contact the library and archives canada, and ask them what the oath was in XXXX year: http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/the-public/005-2000-e.html
Hi Pacifica777 – On Jan 20th you posted links to Prairie Girls (PG) Relinquishment based on being a hospital employee. I was unable to find PGs entries via those links, and am unable to search for PGs entries. I would very much like to know her details as this information may be helpful. Can you identify the entries based on date/time and I can find them that way…or any other way I may be able t locate them. – Thank you very much.
On a similar topic, I have not come across anyone successfully obtaining past relinquishment based on employment in the hospital, school, or university sectors (Prairie Girl’s is the first I’ve seen mentioned). If anyone is aware of individuals successfully obtaining a CLN based on employment in these sectors it would be good to record. The definition of “political subdivision thereof” is not well defined and it would be helpful for others to know what has been considered within this classification. – Geri
Hi Geri,
Something is weird with those links because they’re going to 3 or 4 pages before the page where they should be going — but I”‘l post them here for your convenience because at least they’ll take you quickly to the correct thread.
Here are the dates/times:
2013/12/12 at 9:46 pm
2014/01/16 at 11.27 am
2014/01/16 at 12.30 pm
http://isaacbrocksociety.ca/relinquishment/comment-page-21/#comment-797678
http://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2011/12/12/relinquish-dont-renounce-if-you-can/comment-page-9/#comment-990347
http://isaacbrocksociety.ca/2011/12/12/relinquish-dont-renounce-if-you-can/comment-page-9/#comment-990561
@skeptical
Absolutely beautifully stated!!! Required reading for anyone caught in this outrageous web of injustice and who is momentarily paralysed by fear and anxiety. I have been thinking a lot about how I might potentially have to deal with the banks if I don’t have a CLN (which I currently don’t have and I am not sure if I will ever have – I have lived my life in Canada and am not in the US system: no SSN, no tax or FBAR filings etc.).
Your words have helped to prepare me (even though I hope that day will never come) – our Charter rights must never be violated. I will never show the banks my Canadian passport (with my US place of birth) without a CLN. They will get your responses and can label me a “recalcitrant account holder” but I will never willingly give myself up as a “US person” when I have lived my life only as a Canadian. Your post sent shivers up my spine!
PS – more questions for these accountants who say that “we better file now while the getting’s good” and “you have to do it, why it’s the law”
HOW WOULD YOU FEEL ABOUT PAYING TAXES TO A FOREIGN COUNTRY WHERE YOU’VE NEVER LIVED (AS AN ADULT) OR WORKED?
DO YOU THINK THAT CITIZENSHIP BASED TAXATION IS A JUST LAW?
HOW CAN A COUNTRY THAT CALLS ITSELF THE HOME OF JUSTICE AND FREEDOM HAVE SUCH A LAW?
HOW CAN MY ACCOUNTS BE CALLED “OFFSHORE” WHEN THEY ARE IN MY HOME COUNTRY WHERE I LIVE AND WORK AND PAY TAXES?
@ Mr. A.
I loved Skeptical’s bank dialogue too. I’m keeping it in my wallet. I’m thinking that if a bank did extract a confession out of a USP (“We have ways to make you talk!” — sinister laugh) thereby forcing a signature on a W-9, then that outed USP should demand copies of all his/her bank statements going back 6 years, maybe 8 to be sure — AND in a format which easily pinpoints those annual highest balances which the FBAR (FINCEN 114) requires. I can just see the smoke coming out the computers trying to accomplish that. You see, if someone was unaware of being a USP then there would have been no reason to keep these records at home. Many people just shred their monthly statements, keeping only the most recent ones so they know what their current balances are. There is certainly no CRA regulation requiring you to keep bank statements — just copies of your T5s. IF the banks are so hellbent on complying with FATCA to save their precious a$$ets then outed USPs should make them produce the numbers — at the banks’ expense. If the bank balks, then again, threaten to lawyer up.
@Em
Great point. When I was information gathering for OVDI, I had to request the bank give me several years of bank statements. They wanted to charge me until I mentioned IRS. That of course will change when they become inundated with requests for previous bank statements. Also, when your account is closed, you can not longer access statements on line, unfortunately.
@ bubblebustin
I never do anything bank related online (no ATMs for me either). I like to go look ‘em in the eye. Besides the tellers are actually pretty nice and I like to think I’m helping to keep them employed. Of course it’s easy for me because everything is in walking distance here.
@Em
great idea about getting all your years of bank statements .
@Em
You can only go back several months anyway, online.
@bubble
I wonder if mentioning the irs would work for me too. I’m not filing FBARs yet but just mentally preparing in case I have to renounce instead. Unfortunately, I switched banks 2-3 years ago and my old bank wants to charge me 5$ a page and they won’t scan it quickly to see which statement is the highest. And it’s 10$ a page for my closed brokerage account!!!!! I was just gonna order January and call it a day as i probably withdrew throughout the year. So it would cost a few hundred dollars!!! Like I have enough on my plate already!
Any suggestions for doing my own tax? A guy who works with my mom suggested turbo tax and he is a dual and says it’s easy. It would be nice to have an accountant do it but will will cost me a few thousand to go back 5 years.
@Stressed, turbo tax has a nice interface but not perfect. When using it, I don’t think that I ever “checked the flag” for local bank accounts or reported interest. It probably also won’t expats free-file. You could use it to do most of the work and then maybe print the forms and mail them in to reduce costs.