Photo of Cyndee Todgham Cherniak

Cyndee Todgham Cherniak is the founding lawyer of LexSage, a boutique international trade law and sales tax firm in Toronto, Ontario. She has practiced for almost 20 years at Canada’s top Bay Street law firms.

We have seen cases where the Canada Border Services Agency (“CBSA”) has taken away a Canadian citizen’s NEXUS card due to non-essential travel by the individual. In particular, where the Canadian citizen traveled by car to the United States for what the CBSA determined to be non-essential reasons, the CBSA officer at the land border

On March 26, 2020, the Canada Border Services Agency (“CBSA”) notified certain importers under verification that the CBSA was temporarily suspending trade compliance activities due to COVID-19 – see The CBSA Temporarily Suspends Trade Compliance Activities due to COVID-19.

On May 19, 2020, importers received an update from the CBSA informing external stakeholders that

Canada has indicated that the Canada-U.S. border will remain closed to non-essential travel until June 21, 2020.  “Non-essential” travel includes travel that is considered as tourism or recreational in nature.

The restrictions may be extended again.  On March 21, the restrictions on essential travel across the border were implemented for a 30-day period in an

The Canadian Minister of National Revenue (“Minister”) may, under subsection 231.2(3) of the Income Tax Act, R.S.C. 1985, c. 1 (5th Supp.) and subsection 289(3) of the Excise Tax Act, R.S.C. 1985, c. E-15, seek information from third parties in order to look for tax cheats. The request by the Minister is known

It is unclear whether the import prohibition set out in the Customs Tariff for Tariff Code Item 9897 prohibits goods made in China’s detention camps.  Tariff Item 9897 prohibits the importation of a number of goods, including “[g]oods manufactured or produced wholly or in part by prison labour”.  Unlike the United States, Canada’s import prohibition

The Canada Border Services Agency (“CBSA”) has created a new dedicated Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (“CUMSA”) web-page on which implementation information will be posted to assist importers and exporters. CUSMA / USMCA / NAFTA 2.0 is scheduled to enter into force on July 1, 2020 and there will be no transition period.  This means that importers

When it was announced that Canada, the United States and Mexico had reached an agreement to amend the North American Free Trade Agreement (“NAFTA”), one of the important changes was an increase to the de minimis threshold, which is the monetary value of courier shipments that can enter Canada without payment of duties and taxes.

Many Canadian import businesses have implemented remote working arrangements for employees as a result of COVID-19 government directives.  Social distancing in business organizations can give rise to costly mistakes because business is not as usual.  Importers have to adjust to the new normal and identify new (and existing) business risks.  Most employees and managers are

Most Canadian export controls and controlled goods compliance programs are built with the assumption that relevant employees who have access to controlled goods and technical data will be working in an on-site work environment and use work computers and in-house servers where information is securely stored with access and release restrictions and where work-related activities