From: AlanBaggett@volcanomail.com   
      
   Canada Revenue Agency Declares Woman Dead Then Cuts Off Pensions : CRA SOTW   
      
   By Sean O Shea   
      
   A clerical mistake that declared a Dundas, Ont. woman dead resulted in her   
   government pensions being cut off for two months.   
      
   "It was devastating," said Patricia Gaudette, 66, who contacted Global News   
   after efforts to get re-listed as a living taxpayer were fruitless.   
      
   Gaudette is alive and well, but she hasn't yet received her Canada Pension   
   Plan or Old Age Security benefits totalling about $1,300 a month.   
      
   "They're holding all the cards," she said. "You're dead -- they've got your   
   money."   
      
   On April 5, Gaudette received a notice from the Canada Revenue Agency   
   addressed to "The Estate of the Late Patricia S. Gaudette," a notice which   
   left her stunned.   
      
   "It was a shock, you don't expect to see that."   
      
   In February, Gaudette faced a tragedy: her 30-year-old son Zachary was punched   
   after an altercation outside a restaurant in Kelowna, B.C. He died in hospital   
   and a police investigation has not led to any charges yet.   
      
   Gaudette had recently returned from B.C. when she was confronted with the   
   government error. She contacted her local member of Parliament for assistance,   
   but says she didn't receive any help.   
       
   When she was instructed to bring identification to a Service Canada location,   
   she says officials required more documents, including a marriage certificate.    
   A widow for many years, she says she would have had to order and pay for a   
   replacement document.   
      
   "They take all your money then they send you to all these places to put out   
   money to prove you're alive when they know they made an inside mistake," said   
   Gaudette, whose daughter contacted Global News to help resolve the problem.   
      
   Less than two days after Global called the Canada Revenue Agency, Gaudette   
   received a call from the department explaining she would receive money this   
   week and be reinstated among the list of living taxpayers.   
      
   The CRA would not talk about Gaudette's case specifically, citing privacy   
   regulations, but said mistakes do happen.   
      
   "Occasionally information we receive is incorrect or human error can occur   
   during the processing of a taxpayer's information," said Paul-Noel Murphy,   
   manager of communications for the agency in Ontario, adding that there is a   
   protocol for dealing with    
   errors.   
      
   "Whenever there is any indication that the information the CRA has is   
   incorrect, immediate steps are taken to correct our records and inform our   
   partners. Those steps also include ensuring that affected individuals receive   
   all the benefits and credits to    
   which they are entitled.   
      
   "The error is usually corrected on the day we receive the information that the   
   individual was coded deceased in error."   
      
   But Gaudette's case took weeks to resolve and only after the involvement of   
   Global News.   
      
   Government errors leading to pronouncement of death on paper are more common   
   that you might imagine. Between 2007 and 2013, the government made the same   
   mistake 5,439 times, according to government records.   
      
   The federal Office of the Taxpayers' Ombudsman, an independent agency that   
   investigates complaints about the CRA, issued a report on the problem in 2014.   
   Titled "Alive and Well", the agency made eight recommendations to reduce the   
   effects of mistakes    
   like this.   
   "Put in place and monitor cont   
   rol measures to ensure that when errors do occur, they are detected and   
   corrected as rapidly as possible," the report concluded.   
   Gaudette, upon finding out she is back in the land of living taxpayers, was   
   ecstatic.   
      
   "It sounds mighty fine to me," she said. "Thank you, thank you, thank you."   
   (c) 2016 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.    
      
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