Effective December 1st, the General regulation under the Travel Industry Act, 2002 (TIA) has been amended to further reduce burden on travel agents and wholesalers (registrants) during these unprecedented times.
The full document of regulatory changes can be found here: www.ontario.ca/laws/regulation/r20675
The regulatory changes include:
- Temporarily
exempting registrants from filing Annual Financial Statements
- Providing a two-year exemption from the requirement to file an annual financial statement accompanied by a review engagement report or audit opinion for medium and large registrants and requiring them to only file a verification statement instead, subject to a limited exception.
- Medium registrants are those with annual Ontario sales between $2M to less than $10M in their previous fiscal year. Large registrants are those with annual Ontario sales of $10M or greater in their previous fiscal year.
- This
exemption covers registrants with fiscal year-end dates between December
1, 2020 to November 30, 2022. As such, medium and large registrants who
qualify will benefit twice.
- Extending
the temporary provisions added in March 2020
- Extending
the temporary provisions implemented on March 30, 2020 beyond their
current expiry dates. This would continue to allow:
- Registrants who acquire the rights to travel services for resale to continue for an additional year (until March 31, 2022) to choose to provide a voucher or similar document for future redemption towards travel services.
- The voucher or similar document provided would be in lieu of a refund or comparable alternate travel services acceptable to the customer if a supplier (e.g., airline or cruise line) fails to provide the travel services on or after March 30, 2020 and that failure is related to COVID-19.
- For
two additional years (until March 31, 2024), customers to be eligible to
be reimbursed from the Travel Industry Compensation Fund for unredeemed
vouchers or similar documents that were issued by a registrant but can’t
be redeemed because of the registrant’s failure (e.g., bankruptcy or
insolvency) associated with COVID-19.
- Extending
the temporary provisions implemented on March 30, 2020 beyond their
current expiry dates. This would continue to allow:
- Exempting
REBBA registrants from Short-term Accommodation Rental Properties
- Adding
an exemption for real estate brokerages, brokers and salespersons from
having to register under TIA if they are trading in short-term
accommodation rental properties through the brokerage and are registered
under the Real Estate and Business Brokers Act, 2002 (REBBA), generally
codifying an existing practice.
- Adding
an exemption for real estate brokerages, brokers and salespersons from
having to register under TIA if they are trading in short-term
accommodation rental properties through the brokerage and are registered
under the Real Estate and Business Brokers Act, 2002 (REBBA), generally
codifying an existing practice.
- Commission
Recalls
- Eliminating
the requirement for a registrant to repay commissions and other
remuneration received to the Travel Industry Council of Ontario (TICO),
for the purposes of depositing into the Travel Industry Compensation
Fund.
- Applicable where a customer has filed a claim for travel services paid for and not received.
- Where the customer is eligible to receive a full reimbursement for the amount paid from the Compensation Fund.
- Eliminating
the requirement for a registrant to repay commissions and other
remuneration received to the Travel Industry Council of Ontario (TICO),
for the purposes of depositing into the Travel Industry Compensation
Fund.
TICO is the administrative authority responsible for administering and enforcing the Travel Industry Act, 2002 and its regulation. Click here to read TICO’s bulletin on these amendments.
If you have further questions about the implementation of these regulatory changes, it is recommended that you contact TICO by e-mail at tico@tico.ca or phone at (905) 624-6241.