The good news is there appears to be several ways of avoiding the 15 percent Canadian tax on trust dividends paid to US investors. The bad news: They’ll take a little effort to capitalize on.

Most confusing is trying to make sense of the distinction between trusts’ dividends that are taxed in IRAs and those that aren’t. Legally, no trust held in an IRA by a US investor should be taxed. But it looks like some of the clearing corporations are doing it anyway.

For example, the Depository Trust Corporation (DTC) doesn’t withhold the tax on IRA accounts, as it has a system in place to separate them from ordinary accounts. Canaccord, however, has no such system and does withhold tax. The on-line broker Ameritrade, though, is rumored to be in negotiations to put one in place.

For now, US investors who draw the tax in an IRA can get money back by filing Canadian Form NR7, otherwise known as an “Application for Refund of Non-Resident Part XIII Tax Withheld.” These are generally provided on trusts’ Web sites, or you can call the International Tax Services Office at 1-800-267-3395 from anywhere in North America.

Those holding trusts outside IRAs can file to recover the withholding on their US taxes File 1040 as a Foreign Tax Credit.

If you don’t want to go through any of this, you can simply stick to trusts that are cleared through the DTC. That, of course, limits your choices substantially. But there are a few strong buys that make the cut, including: ARC Energy Trust and Enervest Diversified Income Fund.