My Employer Has Not Sent Me a T4 How Can I File My Income Tax Return?

Posted on 2017 10 05 by BetCrooks

When one of my young relatives first started working, their employer did not mail them their T4 slips which led to a delay in filing their income tax return although they did get it submitted by the deadline. To prevent another delay in the future, my relative decided to sign up for online access to their CRA My Account so they could look online for a copy of their T4 and use it to file their tax return by the April 30 deadline.

Does My Employer Have to Provide Me With a T4 and By When?

In Canada, employers of conventional part-time and full-time employees are required to create a T4 slip for each employee. They must file a copy of the slip with the Canada Revenue Agency. According to the CRA website “Generally, you need to fill out a T4 slip if you are an employer (resident or non-resident) and you paid your employees employment income, commissions, taxable allowances and benefits, fishing income, or any other remuneration.”

The employer is supposed to file the information with the government on the last day of February or the first business day after that, if the last day is on a Saturday or Sunday.

So even if the form itself is not ready to hand to the employee by the first business day in March, the employer should know the information that belongs on it.

The employer is supposed to provide a copy of the T4 to the employee. In reality, though, many employers do not provide the slip on time. What can you do then?

Can I Look Up My T4 Slip Online Somewhere?

If the employer filed the information correctly with the government, you may be able to get a copy of your T4 slip from the CRA instead of directly from your employer!

To see your T4 slips online, you need to have a CRA My Account online account.
My young relative applied for such an account and now can see his T slips online. Next year, if his T4 goes astray again, he will check whether he can get a copy more quickly from the CRA website.

The General Procedure to Open a Personal CRA My Account to Access Tax Slips Like T4s Online

You will need a copy of the income tax return you last submitted that has been processed by the CRA to verify your identity. Your Notice of Assessment will not be useful, you need the actual return you submitted so that you can look up what number you reported on a specific line when they ask you for that number.(The value may differ from that reported on your Notice of Assessment for that same line.)

There is a big slow step in the middle of creating a personal CRA My Account to look at your T4 and other T slips online: you have to wait for Canada Post to deliver you a special access code!

First you apply online and even set up all your security questions.

Then you wait for the CRA to mail you a letter containing a verification code, called a CRA security code.

After you receive the letter, you can input the code online and get complete access to your CRA My Account including access to view your T4 and some other tax slips.

What If I Can’t Wait for the Security Code to File My Taxes?

According to the 2016 Income Tax Guide, if you can’t get your T4 in time, you should estimate your income and deductions as best you can from your pay slips, bank deposits and so on. Then, when you finally get the correct information you can file a change to your income tax return. (See the section “What if you are missing information”)

Applying to Use a Personal CRA My Account to Read Your T4 and Some Other Tax Slips Online

Go the web page for the CRA My Account for Individuals. On September 26, 2017 it is located at https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/e-services/e-services-individuals/account-individuals.html but you may have to use a search engine to find it if they move from that URL.

Part way down the page, click on the button: CRA register

The Validate your identity – social insurance number Page

In the social insurance number text box, type your SIN.

Click on the Next button.

The Validate your identity – continued Page

In the appropriate text box, type your Postal Code

From the drop-down lists, select the day and month of your birth,

In the text box, type the year of your birth

In the Tax information – amount entered on line XXX of your XXXX return text box, type the amount you reported on that specific line of your income tax return.
For example, they may ask you to type the amount you reported on line 120 of your 2016 return.

Note: even if you reported XXX.99 you do not round up your answer. Just report XXX not XXX+1.

The CRA security code notification Page

They will now mail you your CRA security code.

You can also ask to receive your code by email or telephone but you may change all future contact with the CRA by doing this. For example, they may not mail you your Notice of Assessment just email a letter stating you should sign in and read through it.

The Verification – current postal code or ZIP code Page

Read through the information about your postal code and click to reply Yes or No that this is your proper code.

Click on the Next button.

The Create – CRA user ID and password Page

You will now create the User ID and password you will use when looking up information online.

Your User ID must be

8-16 characters long
contain no more than 7 numbers
not contain any spaces
not contain any special characters other than a dot, dash, underscore or apostrophe

Your password must be

8-16 characters long
contain at least one capital (upper case) letter
contain at least one small (lower case) letter
contain at least one number (digit)
not contain any accents
not contain any spaces
not contain any special characters other than a dot, dash, underscore or apostrophe
not repeat any characters 4 times in a row; for example not have AAAA or 1111

When you have typed in your desired User ID and typed in your password twice, click on the Next button.

The Create – security questions and answers page

You will be asked to answer one or more security questions each time you access the My Account website.

The answers you provide for the security questions must

contain at least 3 characters
not contain any special characters other than a dot, dash, underscore or apostrophe

The answers are not case-sensitive so it doesn’t matter if you use capital or small letters (upper or lower case letters)

To set your questions and answers:

From the Question 1 drop-down list select a question.

In the Answer 1 text field type your reply.

Repeat for each of questions 2 to 5.

You can reduce the number of questions you are asked if you have a computer you will routinely use to access My Account and if you believe that computer is fairly secure.

To reduce the numbers of questions, click to not select

Ask me a security question each time I login using this device (recommended if you are using a public or shared device).

and click to select

Do not ask me a security question each time I login using this device

Click on Next

The Review – security questions and answers Page

Read the information on the page.

Click on the Next button

The Terms and conditions of use Page

Read the information on the page.

Somewhere secure, make a note of your User ID:

In the text field, type in your Password

Click on the button I agree or I do not agree

The CRA security code notification –confirmation Page

Note that the CRA will mail your security code in 5-10 days.

Click on the Next button

The My Account terms and conditions of use Page

Read the information on the page.

Click on the button I agree or I do not agree

The Welcome to My Account, YOUR NAME Page

You have limited access until you can enter your CRA security code.

You can view your most recent Notice of Assessment.
You can read your RRSP deduction limit.
You can read how to make a payment to the CRA.

Click on the Logout button when you are finished.

The Secure session ended Page

Read the confirmation that you have logged out.

Click on the Exit button.

After all this you now have to wait for that Canada Post truck to bring the envelope with the security code. What happens next will be in another article.

Related Reading

[How to File Your First Income Tax Return with the CRA]

Join In
Did you ever use your CRA My Account to look up a T slip so you could finish your income tax return? Please share your experience with a comment.

How to Use the CRA My Account Auto-fill Feature to Add Info to your 2015 Tax Return Using StudioTax 2015 for Free

Posted on 2016 03 26 by BetCrooks

The CRA is offering a new service this year. If the tax software you are using to prepare your return offers this feature, you can download information directly from your CRA My Account to fill in parts of your income tax return. I’m going to test using this near CRA feature to try to start completing my income tax return using StudioTax 2015.

What Do I Need to Know or Do Before I Can Use the CRA Online My Account feature to Auto-fill My Return?

You’ll need to be able to sign in to the CRA My Account system. You can test whether you can do that before you ever start completing your taxes.

I have a CRA My Account Userid and Password. I already signed in and looked at which tax forms they have on file for me, such as my T3s and T5s. So I’m ready to make a test.

I also have downloaded and installed StudioTax 2015.

Starting StudioTax 2015 And Choosing to Use the CRA My Account Auto-fill Feature

Start StudioTax.
Because I want to see what StudioTax can get from the CRA, I will not ask StudioTax to open a new file using my 2014 return as a basis. Instead, I will click on the button: Create a new return.
Because I have already filed my 2013 and 2014 returns, I left the answer to the question as No and clicked on the Next button.

The Identification Page

Select your appropriate title from the drop-down list for Title.
I selected: Mrs.

Type the information in the fields

First Name
Last Name
If desired, Initial

Click to select the radio button beside the appropriate choice for

Check if this is your first return or
Check if your name has changed since your last return, or
Otherwise, check to confirm that your name did not change since your last return
My name has not changed.

Type the information in the fields

Enter your Social Insurance Number
Enter your date of birth, Enter Year:

From the drop-down list, for your date of birth,

Select Month
Select Day

Click on the Next button.

The Personal Information – Address Page
Type the relevant information in the text fields:

“Care of” address:
PO Box:
RR:
Street No:
Apt. No:
Street Name:
City:
Province or Territory:
Postal Code:
Phone Number: Home: Work: Extension:

CAUTION!!!: ***Do not provide your email address if you wish to ever get a paper mailed copy of forms such as your Notice of Assessment!*** If you provide your email address they will only send you an email telling you to go to the CRA My Account website and log in to read and print all your mail from the CRA. Many of us don’t want this!

From the drop-down list, select which province or territory you lived in on December 31 2015.

If you changed your province or territory of residence in 2015, tick to check the box and enter the date of the move.

Click to answer Yes or No to whether you home address is the same as your mailing address.

If necessary, from the drop-down list, select your current province or territory if different from the mailing address.

If you were self-employed in 2015, from the drop-down list, select the province or territory of your self-employment.

Click on the Next button.

The Marital Status Page

From the drop-down list, select your Marital Status.

If you want to, click to select

Check if you want to create a spousal linked return and your spouse taxing province is the same as your taxing province.

If applicable, fill in the fields for your spouse

First Name:
Last Name:
Spouse SIN:
Spouse date of birth

And if necessary, check to indicate if your spouse is a non-resident.

Click on the Next button.

The Additional Information Page
If you became or ceased to be a resident of Canada in 2015, provide the date and answer the questions.

Click on the Next button.

The second Additional Information Page
If applicable, check if
The return is for a deceased person

If this is a pre-bankrupt return

And provide the requested information

Click on the Next button.

The CRA Questions Page
Click to select whether you want the CRA to contact you in English or French.

Click to inform the CRA of whether you hold or owned foreign property in 2015 with a total cost of more than CAN $100,000.

Click on the Next button.

The Elections Canada Page
Click to answer Yes or No whether you are a Canadian Citizen.

If yes, click to select Yes or No as to whether the CRA can provide your name and address to Elections Canada to use for elections.

Click on the Next button.

The Auto-fill my return Page

Finally! I was wondering if I’d missed something! So here comes the new part for 2015/2016.

First, read the info:
“Auto-fill my return
If you have a CRA Online My Account, then you can retrieve the tax data from your CRA account and use the data to auto-fill your return. Otherwise do not use this step.”

There are two help topics you can read by clicking on the links:

Auto-fill my return help
Learn more about the CRA My Account

There is a big blank area with the comment “The retrieved data will be listed here.”

I’m ready to try the test, so I clicked on the button:

Press this button to start

The Auto-fill my return Page

If you know how to login to your CRA My Account, click to check the box beside:
“Check this box to confirm that you have a CRA online access. Otherwise you cannot retrieve the tax data from the CRA server.”

Check your name and Sin number are correct, then click the OK button.

Read the message about Auto-fill my return

Note that you cannot pull the info for a friend, relative or other person without an authorization form, T1013.

Note that you must also make sure that you include information from other sources that the CRA does not yet have available before you file your tax return. For example, the CRA does not have all my T3 slips yet!

Once you’ve finished reading, if you still want to proceed, click on the OK button.

Your web browser will open the CRA My Account sign in page.

I clicked the button for CRA Login.

I signed in as usual.

The HUGE Auto-fill my return—Terms and Conditions of Use page will open.

Read through it carefully.

If you are SURE that you can accept these terms, click on the button: I agree

The Auto-fill my return –request confirmation Page

Check that the SIN number is correct; if so, click on Next.

There will be a message saying it is getting the data.

The Autofill My Return Progress Window
If all goes well, you will get a big green circle with a white checkmark and the message:

“The tax data is retrieved successfully. Press Close to manage the retrieved data.”

So I clicked on the button: Close.

Note: My browser session with the CRA automatically closed somehow without me clicking on the Logout button.

The Auto-fill my return Page
Now, instead of blank space, I have two boxes.

In the Tax data listing box

Show data for SIN: and my SIN is listed

Add the checked items to the return

Is followed by a list of items from the CRA My Account service including:

T5 Statement – Payer’s Name Big Canadian Corporation
T5 Statement – Payer’s Name Second Big Canadian Corporation
RC62 Statement
RRSP info
Capital Gains Deduction
Capitals gains and losses
Non-Capital Losses
Unhandled tax data

There are two buttons:

Select all tax data items
Decline all tax data items

The second box is titled: Tax data preview

And underneath is Print

The space below is blank.

I clicked on the Select all tax data items button.

That put a check mark beside each of my items from my CRA My Account.

The space below preview is still blank!

So I clicked on the name of one of the T5 statements, and it suddenly was displayed in the Preview section.

I looked through the different previews, especially for the odder choices like Non-Capital losses.

Strangely, there is no preview for my RC62 Statement.

I then clicked on the Add the checked items to the return button.

StudioTax warns you that if you already typed in the same T slip information you will now have it reported twice on your tax return. Since that could make you pay income tax on twice as much money as you really earned, you may want to make sure you review your tax return in detail before submitting it!

To dismiss the warning, Click OK.

Studiotax advised me that it will not automatically enter my

Capital gains deductions
Capital gain losses, and
Non capital losses information from the CRA My Account download.

I’ll have to enter them myself or they may not be needed.

To dismiss the warning, Click OK.

To get out of the Auto-fill my return page, I had to click to Decline all tax data items to de-select the above listed unusable data.

Then click the Next button.

What Happens Next?
Now I’m back to the regular StudioTax information entry interview questions, asking for which T slips I have and for which I want to enter data. So I will continue with the StudioTax process for the forms which were not yet in the CRA My Account file.

What Did the Auto-fill Feature Put Into My StudioTax 2015 Tax Return for Me?

I’ll take a quick look, though, at what data was auto-input by clicking Finish.

Well, there’s my UCCB income on Line 117 so even though there was no preview of the RC62 statement, it came in ok.

And there on Line 121 is the taxable Canadian dividends from the T slips that are in my CRA My Account file. (But I still have another one to enter by hand that’s not with the CRA yet.)

On Line 121, there’s some of my interest income but not for the bank accounts that paid less than $50. I’ll have to manually update my tax return with that information because you have to pay tax on any interest earned, even if they don’t send you a T5.

On Schedule 4, for both the dividends and the interest section, it doesn’t actually specify what the income is from, it just says “From information slips.” I’ll have to edit that, if I can, to state which sources are quoted so I know for my own records in the future.

Or maybe I don’t need to! When I open the T5s the info about who paid what and why is listed properly. Good stuff!

How Do I Rate the CRA My Account Auto-fill Feature for Use with StudioTax 2015?

Overall, this has been a good test. It did find and bring in the data from my T slips.

It’s not perfect though because

not all of my T slips are in my CRA My Account file yet, specifically some T3s
it didn’t auto-fill my name, address, date of birth, etc. I think it’s annoying to type that in every year.

Will I Use the CRA My Account Auto-fill Option Next Year?

Yes. I hope they enhance it a bit more in the interim to reduce the need to type even more repetitive data such as my name, address, birth date, etc.

Related Reading

Join In
Did you use this new auto-fill feature to help prepare your tax return? Anything unexpected happen? Please share your experience with a comment.

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Tag Archives: T4

My Employer Has Not Sent Me a T4 How Can I File My Income Tax Return?

Does My Employer Have to Provide Me With a T4 and By When?

Can I Look Up My T4 Slip Online Somewhere?

The General Procedure to Open a Personal CRA My Account to Access Tax Slips Like T4s Online

What If I Can’t Wait for the Security Code to File My Taxes?

Applying to Use a Personal CRA My Account to Read Your T4 and Some Other Tax Slips Online

How to Use the CRA My Account Auto-fill Feature to Add Info to your 2015 Tax Return Using StudioTax 2015 for Free

What Do I Need to Know or Do Before I Can Use the CRA Online My Account feature to Auto-fill My Return?

Starting StudioTax 2015 And Choosing to Use the CRA My Account Auto-fill Feature

What Did the Auto-fill Feature Put Into My StudioTax 2015 Tax Return for Me?

How Do I Rate the CRA My Account Auto-fill Feature for Use with StudioTax 2015?

Will I Use the CRA My Account Auto-fill Option Next Year?