Ten thousand places will be made available for Irish Workers through Canada’s IEC visa programme this year. In 2014 Ireland was granted 10,700 places for the same programme and this figure was 6,250 in 2013.
 
Taxback.com say these numbers show evidence of the Canada’s popularity as a destination for Irish workers – and the tax experts say the IEC programme is just one route to Canadian employment, so the actual numbers leaving Ireland for a Canadian work are much greater than this. 
 
The organisation say that judging from applications submitted since the tax deadline of April 30th, it could be a bumper year for Canadian tax refunds to Irish workers.

Taxback.com are urging any Irish worker who has returned from a stint in Canada to apply for a tax refund – the Taxback.com average of which is $904. This time of year is busiest for processing applications because although the Canadian tax year is the same as Ireland (1st January – 31st December), the tax return deadline is 30th April. 
 
Catherine Murphy of www.taxback.com explains, “Canada has always been a popular choice for the Irish workforce abroad - following the economic downturn many Irish went there looking for new opportunities. And now many of these people are actually returning or have already returned home. Given the fact that you can claim your tax refund for as far back as 10 years ago we envisage that many of these returned workers will step forward in 2015 to reclaim what’s owed – making this one of the biggest years yet for Canadian tax refunds.

Around the world most of the people we process Canadian tax refunds for are working in ski resorts. However, looking at the Irish market alone- although occupations vary – most are coming from the Canadian construction sector. One of the biggest refunds we have had for an Irish person in 2013 was for a 35 year old applicant who had worked in the construction industry who claimed back $8,300."

Source: www.businessworld.ie