As part of the changes to the HST, the general place of supply rules for services had amendments proposed to put more emphasis on the location of the customer rather than the vendor.

The general place of supply rules will not apply to certain services including amongst others:

• Personal services
• Services in relation to real property
• Services in relation to tangible personal property
• Services in relation to a location specific event
• Passenger and certain other transportation services
• Postage, telecommunication, telephone, internet

It is important for businesses to identify whether or not the service is a specified service so that, for example, a barber in Manitoba doesn’t worry about trying to charge HST on a haircut to a vacationer from Ontario because the barber is trying to apply the general rules (customer address), rather than the specific personal services rule (location of service).