The Retail Council of Canada says retailers welcome the temporary tax relief, but wish they had more lead time to make the necessary changes.

Atlantic Director Jim Cormier says there’s a lot of work that needs to be done to ensure that retailers are no longer applying the tax to eligible items by mid-December.

“It does mean that it’s going to be a really quick turnaround, where my members are going to have to electronically or manually reset their scanners for point-of-sale, and then after Christmas, change them all back again. So that can be problematic. We’re of two minds. It’s a good announcement but having a little more lead time into it would have been better.”