Canadian Online Tax Filing System Down

A computer malfunction has forced Canada’s tax agency to shut down all online tax filing as Canadians race to file their personal income tax returns by the April 30 deadline.

And if the problem isn’t resolved within a few days, the agency may have to look at options, including a possible extension of the tax deadline.

“We’re not there yet, but obviously if this lasts longer than a few days we’ll have to start to think about measures, but not at this point,” Michel Dorais, commissioner of the Canada Revenue Agency, said Tuesday.

Dorais ordered the shutdown Monday night when the agency discovered “irregularities” that could affect the 75 data bases that handle Canadians’ personal tax information.

The shutdown affects the millions of Canadians who file their tax returns online using the agency’s Efile, Netfile and My Account services.

Dorais said technical experts have yet to pinpoint the problem, but stressed it is an “infrastructure” problem. He said it may be related to maintenance work that was done over the weekend.

He added that causes such as intrusion, a computer virus or a hacker breaking into the system have been ruled out. [...]

For now, the agency has posted a notice of the shutdown on its website and intends to issue daily updates to the media on the steps it’s taking. Canadians who want to file can send in paper returns or wait until the problem is fixed and file electronically.

Dorais said the tax agency has been working around the clock to find the cause of the problem which is “mixing up” data.

“The integrity of the information is not affected. The information is there but it’s not always in the right place,” said Dorais. “It’s like the table of contents or the index (of those data bases) have been mixed up so they don’t correspond to each other... so I froze everything for a couple of days…until we diagnose the problem and then gradually bring them back on line.”

The tax season typically kicks off after the March 1 deadline for RRSPs and reaches a peak in late April. The biggest volume of tax returns typically arrives after the Easter weekend.

A computer glitch of this magnitude could be a serious setback for the agency, which has watched its online services explode in recent years. The agency handles 23 million personal tax returns a year and about half of those are filed using Netfile and Efile.