The Charities Directorate has announced that Canadian registered charities will have until December 31, 2020 to file their annual Registered Charities Information Return (the T3010). The announcement applies to any registered charity required to file their return between March 18, 2020 and December 31, 2020. At the same time, the Charities Directorate announced that it would be suspending its operations until further notice. The call centre and all registration and audit activities are suspended. See https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/campaigns/covid-19-update/covid-19-charities.html
Please note that the wording of the notice explicitly references only those registered charities required to file between March 18 and December 31, 2020. This appears not to be an across-the-board extension to all registered charities as those charities, who might have been required to file their T3010 by March 18, 2020, are not provided with any timing relief. Since the Directorate will not be operating for some period of time, any registered charity that is now late is unlikely to find itself subject to an enforcement activity in that period. To be safe, it should, however, finalize its T3010 and file it before the Charities Directorate resumes activity.
Despite the suspension of operations, registered charities can file their T3010 on-line through their CRA "My Business Account". Your authorized representative can also do that on your behalf.
The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.
