Précis: Mr. Helgesen was a 50% shareholder and one of two directors of 1072519 Alberta Ltd. (the “Corporation”) which operated an OK Tire franchise . The other shareholder and director, Mr. Pyle, ran the Corporation’s day to day operations and his wife acted as corporate bookkeeper. CRA assessed Mr. Helgesen for roughly $200,000 in unremitted source deductions and GST. The Tax Court rejected Mr. Helgesen’s “due diligence” defence holding that he “did not exercise the degree of care, diligence and skill that a reasonably prudent person would have exercised in comparable circumstances” [para. [32]]. As a result the appeal was dismissed with costs.
Helgesen v. R. - TCC: Passive investor/director did not exercise due diligenceREAD MORE »