# Fbar Facta NR4



## FilingLate

I am a Canadian Citizen working and living in the US for 7 years now.

I have been so careless for my Canadian Bank account i generated income around 
150 to 500$ per year for the past 6 years and never noticed until last year when CRa contacted.

In short they just asked me to refile the 2007 return which i did and that's about it on the Canadian side

Last year after that incident i took the money and shifted it into a NR account with same bank

I have just received a NR4 form from CRA i am just wondering what to do?

For how long do i have to file Facta, Fabr and the missed earned income for the past 3 years or 6 years?

Can anyone please explain this to me. I am also wondering how much fine are we talking about for filing fbar or facta late

Would the NR4 trigger the IRS to ask me for Facta, Fabr filing?
Thanks


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## BBCWatcher

FilingLate said:


> For how long do i have to file Facta, Fabr and the missed earned income for the past 3 years or 6 years?


The 6 previous plus the current year for FBARs. So that would be (now, as I write this) 2007-2012 inclusive plus 2013. See below re: FATCA.



> I am also wondering how much fine are we talking about for filing fbar or facta late


FATCA is part of your IRS tax returns. It's an entirely different, separate report. If you need to file FATCAs you'd file amended IRS tax returns. At this moment in time 2010-2012 inclusive plus 2013 should be enough, though if you weren't subject to U.S. income tax filing for all those years you can amend just the returns you were required to submit.

There's presently no penalty for late FBARs or FATCAs voluntarily filed without government prompting. The general advice is that this lenience won't last forever given that the IRS and Treasury are getting more data and referring more people for prosecution, so now's a good time to get compliant. Rich people with undeclared Swiss bank accounts, for example, may be too late. I saw that the Treasury and IRS just grabbed half the foreign (mostly Swiss-held) assets of some guy in New Mexico, but he had also allegedly defrauded the U.S. Department of Agriculture, so that probably didn't help. "Naked" FBAR/FATCA prosecutions seem to be pretty rare still. Even so, now's a good time to file.



> Would the NR4 trigger the IRS to ask me for Facta, Fabr filing?


"Not sure." The U.S. and Canada just agreed to some data sharing on financial accounts starting soon. Maybe that account would be covered, maybe not. Though it's probably fair to say that if Canada isn't too thrilled with you, Canada would be more likely than usual to share data with their new colleagues in the U.S.


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## Bevdeforges

Just a note here - if you're resident in the US, you only need to worry about FATCA if your foreign accounts have a cumulative balance of $50,000 or more. You need to file FBAR if the combined balance exceeds $10,000.

At the moment, the Canadian "reminders" you received won't automatically trigger any sort of notice to the IRS. What you should do is concentrate on filing this year's (i.e. for 2013) tax return and FBAR on time - April 15th for the tax return and June 30th for the FBAR filing.

Then, work on amending your prior returns to include the interest from your Canadian accounts, and getting up to date on the FBAR filings for the years you need to file (i.e. 6 years in arrears).
Cheers,
Bev


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## FilingLate

Thank You so much for your help

I have some follow up question
1) For 2007 i filed resident tax in both US and Canada (based on the advice of my accountant i didnt even knew at the time that you can be a resident at one place. Can that create any issues with FBAR filing now for 2007? I am thinking no because the statue of limitation should expire?

2) Do you guys know any good accountants? I just spoke with Serbinski and Joanna King based out of windsor. Serbinski seems busy and Joanna king i don't know how she is don't know much about her

Your advice will be much appreciated
Thanks


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## jbr439

BBCWatcher said:


> ...
> "Not sure." The U.S. and Canada just agreed to some data sharing on financial accounts starting soon. Maybe that account would be covered, maybe not. Though it's probably fair to say that if Canada isn't too thrilled with you, Canada would be more likely than usual to share data with their new colleagues in the U.S.


FWIW, Canada and the US have had some form of data sharing for quite a while now. What has just been agreed to is a FATCA IGA which goes beyond the current situation.


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## FilingLate

FWIW, Canada and the US have had some form of data sharing for quite a while now. What has just been agreed to is a FATCA IGA which goes beyond the current situation.



I might be able to add when i left Canada stupid me i didn't file anything just packed my stuff and left for the US for 7 years i received T5's from banks and didnt paid any attention (dunno what i was thinking). In the amount of a few hundred dollars every year for 7 years. i was contact by a CRA agent very nice gentleman last year who just wanted to know if i was filing taxes in the US and needed me to send my US tax return. I got the tax return from IRS and mailed it to this person who then called me back and said thanks you will get an answer shortly and the case was closed all they needed me to do was to refile the 2007 return

I doubt if CRA and IRS was sharing any data this person would have asked me to send him certified IRS tax returns.


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## Nononymous

If your only Canadian income was a few hundred dollars from interest, and you weren't living in Canada, then you didn't need to be filing in Canada. You probably should've declared non-residency when you left, but obviously it was no big deal if after seven years all you received was a polite phone call to establish that you'd left the country.

If you feel sufficiently insecure, amend your US returns by adding those few hundred in income, and file FBARs for those six years if the total balance exceeded $10k. You could probably just start with this year and forget about past years, but who knows.

FATCA won't automatically report those Canadian accounts unless, as Bev said, they have a balance in excess of $50k. So it's not like there's a gun being held to your head.



> FWIW, Canada and the US have had some form of data sharing for quite a while now. What has just been agreed to is a FATCA IGA which goes beyond the current situation.


Is there in fact regular data sharing prior to FATCA? I don't mean investigations or things like that. What data is regularly shared between countries today? And even FATCA isn't looking as bad as feared, since it exclude all the registered tax-exempt accounts, and at least initially requires quite a high balance ($1 million?) to trigger retroactive citizenship questions on existing accounts.


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## FilingLate

Nonomous i have to file facta as well my bank account is just a bit over 50k

I am just wondering if you perhaps went through the same scenerio i am reading article after article which states that you need to file OVDI

I wanted to add an article from Forbes but the system does not allow me to do that
I will add an article from forbes shortly

Thanks


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## FilingLate

here is the article

Is Filing Your First FBAR Admitting To A Crime? - Forbes

Thanks


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## Nononymous

You don't file FATCA. FATCA files you. (When it happens, your bank will report that data, which might one day be matched up to your FBAR.) As long as your bank knows that you live in the US, there's nothing you need to do for FATCA.

OVDI is for criminals. Avoid it at all costs.

I'm willfully (cheerfully) non-compliant as an act of civil disobedience. Dual Canada-US citizen living in Canada. Haven't filed US tax returns since I lived in the US for a few years in the early 90s. Not filing now, not filing FBARs, and if the bank asks about citizenship for FATCA, refusing to answer the question. 

My role here is to tell Canadians to calm down, don't lose sleep, and think long and hard about what information they need to reveal. The US has no ability to collect penalties or monies owed in Canada, so it's pretty easy to thumb your nose at the IRS from north of the border. You, on the other hand, live in the US, so the man has you by the short and curlies.


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## FilingLate

Does this sequence sounds right
File this year return along with Fbar.
File the previous years Amended tax return along with the T5 information
File fbar for the previous years. 

Anyone else here filed late recently or am i the only one?
Thanks


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## jbr439

Re Canada US data sharing: my understanding was that Canada would send interest/dividend/? information to the US for accounts which are owned by non-residents of Canada who live in the US, and the US would do likewise. Of course, I could be wrong on this as it's just "my understanding".

In any case, the "consolidated version of the Canada-United States Convention with Respect to Taxes on Income and on Capital" does have a section on "Exchange of Information", which starts off:

_1. The competent authorities of the Contracting States shall exchange such information as is relevant for carrying out the provisions of this Convention or of the domestic laws of the Contracting States concerning taxes to which the Convention applies insofar as the taxation thereunder is not contrary to the Convention. _​
See https://www.fin.gc.ca/treaties-conventions/usa_-eng.asp

Not sure exactly what it all means, but there it is.


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## Nononymous

Okay, makes sense that they would do stuff like that for non-residents. Quite different than FATCA, which is Canada sending off information about residents.


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## FilingLate

Nonomous quick question when i file should i do the streamline filing?
Does that depends on how much money you owe to the IRS.
I have around 200-400$ per year for 5 years is it advisable to do a streamline filing?
Sorry i am just reading about OVDI VS Streamline filing

Can you advice me a bit more on streamline filing


Edit
Sorry i am a resident it seems like streamline filing does not work for me


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## Nononymous

Honestly, I'm the last person to offer advice, beyond stay the hell away from OVDI.

For the piddly small amounts involved I'd probably just amend the returns and say "oops" if ever asked; if I was planning to return to Canada in a few years, I'd ignore it completely.


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