Julia Stavreff CPA

On March 23, 2020, The Government of Ontario  ordered  ordered all non-essential stores and services to close at 11:59 p.m. on Tuesday March 24 in an attempt to slow the spread of COVID-19.  CBC news has published a detailed “Ontario Government List of Essential Businesses” which you may find helpful.

In response to the unfolding COVID-19 situation in Ontario and the advice of the health authorities,  we  are closing our office effective Sunday March 22,  for a week. Our work continues,  but  all of our staff are now working from home.

Our Staff  all have their  business email accessible from home. The best way to reach them for online discussion, or to arrange a telephone meeting,  is  via their business email addresses, (which are shown on the “Contact us” page of this website). Paper  documentation that you may need to convey to us  can be dropped off by yourselves or couriered to our business address and left in the drop-box located just inside our main entrance.

Terri Heggum-Allen’s  firm, Loftus Allen CPA, with whom we share premises,  have the majority of their staff working remotely; but two or three of them are  continuing  to work out of the  office for now. If you are planning to do a drop-off, we recommend that you first contact Julia or one of our staff  people by e-mail. If you arrive at the office for a drop-off, and find the doors are locked , call our office number 416-621-8050, or the Loftus Allen office number 416-626-7333.  If someone is there, they  can let you in for the drop-off.

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For both Julia Stavreff CPA and Loftus Allen CPA  the following Office Rules  are in place for COVID-19 mitigation:

OFFICE RULES FOR COVID-19 MITIGATION

To combat the spread of COVID-19 and protect our clients and our office staff we expect all staff to do the following:

• Maintain a 6 foot “social distance” from other staff and clients.
• No touching , handshaking, etc.
• Work only in your own workstation.
• After using common areas such as washrooms, kitchen area, and meeting rooms wipe down anything you’ve touched, and wash your hands with soap and water
• Wipe surfaces before and after client visits (or internal meetings) in Boardroom or Meeting Room.
• Before booking a meeting , verify with clients that they have not been out of country in the preceding two weeks, have not been diagnosed as having Covid-19, and have not met in the past two weeks with someone who has COVID-19. In any of these cases, under health authority guidance they are expected to self-quarantine. Defer the in-person meeting and/or recommend a telephone meeting instead.
• Also verify with any clients wanting an in-person meeting that they not have COVID symptoms (basically the same as a bad cold or flu). If they have you should again defer the in-person meeting and/or recommend a telephone meeting instead.
• In general, ask clients to meet and discuss matters over the telephone, rather than in-person, whenever possible.
• Ensure that any of your clients visiting our office respect social distancing while here and encourage them to do so even when not at our offices
• For drop-offs of paperwork, advise the clients to use our drop-boxes near the main office entrance rather than handing them to a receptionist. If they arrive and find the office doors locked, they may call the office telephone numbers (Loftus Allen 416-626-7333, Julia P Stavreff CA 416-621-8050) ; someone may be here who can let them to access the drop boxes (which are located in the front hallway just inside the office).
• Even when away from the office, you and your family are strongly encourage to follow the general Health Authority guidance on Social Distancing. (See Toronto Public Health “COVID -19 Fact Sheet” which is posted in various places in the office.

Julia Stavreff    Terri Heggum-Allen

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Several of our clients have been enquiring about the   Canadian Government   COVID-19 Response plans  that were announced today in a televised address  by the prime minister.

The following link provides detailed written information that you may find helpful: :

https://www.canada.ca/en/department-finance/news/2020/03/canadas-covid-19-economic-response-plan-support-for-canadians-and-businesses.html

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Personal  income tax season,  is here, and it is time to get  your supporting  information to our office.  See our Personal Income Tax Checklist for 2019.

Note that the filing deadline for personal income tax returns  has recently  been changed by the Government from April 30 to June 1 due to  the COVID-19 situation.  Nevertheless we  encourage you to get your information to us  as soon as you can to avoid a last minute crunch.

Personal income tax payments that would have been   due on April 30, and personal income tax installments that would have been  due  on June 15 have now been deferred by the government to the end of August. No  interest  or  penalties  will  be charged  nor accrued if payments are made by August 31, 2020..

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In order to facilitate a security upgrade of  our email and our website, we are changing our primary internet domain name from stavreff.com to stavreff.ca. Please direct your emails to our staff to the new stavreff.ca email addresses shown on our “contacts” page. The  new email addresses are the same as previously, except that the domain name part of the address is changed to stavreff.ca.

Our new  website address is https://stavreff.ca.  As of March 25, 2019 we are automatically redirecting  www.stavreff.com to https://stavreff.ca. This is a transitional measure and  we  recommend that you access the new website directly using the new address.  It suffices to enter stavreff.ca in your web browser since  the prefix https:// is added automatically.