Canadian GST/HST refund any more?

[abc]

All the talk about Canadian mountains ended up getting me to go up to Canada... in the summer! (last weekend)

I haven't gone to Canada for any extended time the last few years. Seems things had changed with regard to the sales tax refund scheme?

I vaguely recall getting tax refund at the border/airport without fuss (only to "re-deposit" it back to Canada by buying booze at the duty-free shop). But clearly that's no longer.

It seems there's still the possibility of filling out paperwork and mailing in all the receipts, etc. to get the refund. Clearly, one isn't going to bother unless the tax is significant. The last few times I went to Canada, I didn't stay long enough to pay enough hotel tax worth looking into how that works. Nor did I buy anything "big ticket" enough to be motivated about getting the sales tax refunded either. But with the Canadian dollar still cheap, the latter possibility is there, if I can figure out how the tax refund works.

Has anyone done that recently? Getting either the hotel tax refunded? Or bought any goods to take back to the US? How does that work these days?

 

[steamboat1]

Google is your friend.

http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/tx/bsnss/tpcs/gst-tps/rbts/vstrs/fctp-eng.html

 

[abc]

So, they discontinued the program so there's no more refund.

Is that's the experience?

(2007! that's a long time ago they've changed)

 

[JimG.]

The hotel tax was a lot but not more than I remember at resorts in the NE.

The exchange is certainly your friend though. I took my 2 boys to MSA and for 3 people for 4 days the final bill per person worked out to US $111 for lodging and lift tickets per day. That was for a spacious lift side condo and skiing at one of 3 mountains each day. True, my youngest was only 13 at the time so he got a youth pass but that's a great deal.

 

[dlague]

Ya we experienced this about 5 years ago around the same time they started requiring passports. We stopped going to Canada because we got lazy about getting our passports, the canadian exchange rate was close to even and the tax refund deal was gone. We regularly went to the duty free store where 55 and 91 meet in Derby Line.

Funny thing, we used to get our ski gear at a place in Sherbrooke called EconoSports and their pricing was not fixed to the exchange rate. Last fall we went back and found more stuff more closely tied to the exchange rate so products were about the same as in shops in the US.

 

[abc]

That's pretty much it. The Canadian dollar was high for several years and I stopped going up there. Then after the CAD came down, that's when I found out the tax refund was "different"! AKA, GONE!

(So the tax refund had been gone for a long time, I didn't stay up there long enough to be motivated to find out the truth the last couple years, mistakenly thought it's just the procedure hassle. Haha! Wishful thinking)