During the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Government of Canada provided businesses with access to various relief programs, including the 10% Temporary Wage Subsidy, a program that allowed for reductions on payroll remittances for eligible businesses between March 18 to June 19, 2020. Originally, businesses were advised no applications would be necessary to access these relief measurers given the urgency of the situation – that has now changed.

The Canada Revenue Agency (“CRA”) has announced two new compliance initiatives that will confirm the accuracy and consistency of claims to ensure that no fraudulent claims were made when accessing relief programs:

1. PD27 Form: 10% Temporary Wage Subsidy Self-Identification Form for Employers
   PD27 Form must be completed by any business which received the 10% Temporary Wage Subsidy. This form requires that employers identify which payroll entity claimed the subsidy, the number of eligible individuals and the subsidy amount claimed per period. The CRA recommends that PD27 Form be completed and submitted as soon as possible so that any discrepancies can be rectified before the end of the calendar year. More information and a link to the fillable form can be found here.
2. T4 Reporting Requirements
   The CRA has also announced amendments to T4 slips for the 2020 tax year. The four new T4 codes are intended to validate claims made under the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy (CEWS), the Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB), and the Canada Emergency Student Benefit (CESB). The codes are as follows:

Code 57: Employment income: March 15 to May 9
Code 58: Employment income: May 10 to July 4
Code 59: Employment income: July 5 to August 29
Code 60: Employment income: August 30 to September 26

More information can be found here.

Want More?

We encourage any businesses still making use of the Government of Canada’s relief initiatives to regularly visit Canada.ca for application updates and revised technical guidelines. And as always, stay tuned to this space for updates. If you would like to discuss the information above, feel free to contact Ryley Mennie, Lou Poskitt or Connor Levy from our Workplace Law Group.