Income Tax Technical News No. 37 (2008) indicates that non-deductible expenses must be deducted in computing safe income on hand. What are non-deductible expenses for the purposes of s. 55?
CRA indicated that non-deductible expenses can be generally described as cash outflows which are not deducted in the computation of a corporation’s net income for tax purposes, other than an expense or disbursement made for the acquisition of property or for the repayment of the principal amount of a loan - and safe income should be reduced by such non-deductible expenses in order to determine the safe income on hand.
Some examples of non-deductible expenses include:
- dividend paid or payable;
- taxes, including refundable taxes;
- non-deductible interest and penalties;
- charitable donations, gifts and political donations that are not already deducted in net income for tax purposes; and
- the non-deductible portion of expenses or expenditures such as the non-deductible portion of meal and entertainment expenses.
In addition to the above items, 2016-0672321C6 states that contingent liabilities and accounting reserves also need to be taken into account.