There is definitely something that can be done for SR&ED claims that have been rejected by the CRA.
While the CRA does endeavour to assign a reviewer to your claim that already has knowledge of your field, this doesn’t always happen. In cases such as these, the CRA reviewer may not always fully understand the technology that you are using and why your activities are eligible for the SR&ED program. If you have an experience where you feel a mistake has been made about your claim, you can always either submit an amendment or an appeal.
You are able to submit an amendment to your claim to further explore the SR&ED eligibility of your projects within 18 months of your fiscal year end.
If you happen to believe that the reviewer did not fairly implement the SR&ED guidelines during your review, you can file an appeal. The appeal must be submitted within 90 days of the date of the Notice of Assessment that you receive.
The Scientific Research and Experimental Development program was developed to help any companies in Canada that do any kind of research and development. While this does include work that is done in a science lab, it can also include many other areas of work.
This program helps reward companies who are developing new products, improving existing products, and developing or improving processes. This could be anything from pharmaceuticals to plastic manufactured products to metal fabrication to food products – bottom line is that if you are developing or improving something and run into technical obstacles, you probably qualify for the program.
If you are wondering whether you qualify, we can help! Contact us to set up a free, no-obligation meeting where we can help you determine if you should apply for the SR&ED program!
This is one thing that people ask us about all the time – whether the CRA reviewing your SR&ED claim will cause the CRA to call a tax audit on their company.
I can understand why they would be worried about this. A tax audit can take up a lot of your time, is a lot of work, and can be a headache to get through. One would want to avoid a tax audit if one could.
So, it’s a relief to learn that an SR&ED review, in fact, will not trigger a tax audit. Because the SR&ED division of the CRA operates separately from other divisions, what happens in regards to your SR&ED claim stays within the SR&ED division of the CRA, and the results of your SR&ED claim does not determine whether the CRA will call a tax audit on your company.
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