When it comes to a Direct Selling Company’s legal relationship with its Distributors, Canadian direct sellers are treated differently from those in the US, where IRS deeming rules operate to clarify that Distributors are independent contractors and not employees!
In Canada, there is no such special status, and the “common law” determines employee vs. independent contractor (“IC”) status, making this a perennial compliance issue.
Most of Canada’s largest provinces have a version of something usually called an “Employer Health Tax” – or “EHT” for short – and that is imposed on provincial employers based on annual employee remuneration.
While EHTs are levied provincially, just how these provincial taxes are supposed to work intra-jurisdictionally is complicated. Think of an employer, with multiple work locations and with “remote employees scattered across Canada reporting to those multiple work locations. With all of those permutations and combinations, EHT liability can become a difficult question, fraught with potential double-tax issues.