GO PUBLIC 'Doesn't seem right': Grieving families slapped with carbon tax for cremation

By Rosa Marchitelli, Rachel Ward, CBC News Posted: Jan 12, 2017 3:00 AM MT
Excerpts from story: Link above to full story.
Two grieving Alberta families have each been slapped with a $100 carbon tax bill after having a relative cremated, just days after the tax was introduced in that province. The $100 fee was handwritten on Ed Connon's bill when he paid to cremate his 93-year-old mother, Margaret Connon, who died Jan. 7. The funeral home staff had no explanation for him.
"I said, 'wow.' She just kind of looked at me and I said, 'this doesn't seem right'."
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MacLeod was told her mother's cremation used enough natural gas to create five tonnes of carbon dioxide, or the amount of natural gas used to heat an average home for almost a year, leading to the $100 charge.
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The province says that charge was out of line, claiming the carbon tax per cremation should equal, on average, less than $1 and not more than $4. A cremation generally costs between from $1,500 and $2,700.
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At first, funeral home owner Diann Rowat told Go Public that the price was so high because "carbon tax is not just on cremation. It's on every fuel product you use, so it's also on the gas on our funeral vehicles." But then Rowat asked her accountants to double-check — and they found they were off by a decimal point.'We feel foolish'In fact, the funeral home should have charged $10.09, she said. "We feel foolish and extremely apologetic that it took a complaint to you guys to make me ask to re-do the math on this," Rowat told Go Public. "It was totally our fault." All families charged the $100 fee will be reimbursed and receive an apology phone call, she said.
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British Columbia also has a carbon tax that applies to cremation services.
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Don Quixote Note:
Wonder if they were also charged the 5% GST on top of the Carbon Tax??  At least in B.C. there is no PST on cremation. (see link below)
http://www.sbr.gov.bc.ca/documents_library/bulletins/pst_140.pdf   (excerpted below)
You do not charge PST on the following services:
funeral services, including: • arranging and managing a funeral • preparing or transporting human remains • providing visitation and viewing • performing a funeral or wake • cremation and interment services • scattering ashes • opening and closing a lot, crypt or niche
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http://www.grandrivercremation.com/index.php?
p=6&d=cremation
Prices for a cremation service in Ontario does charge HST on this service.