Reminder - Help us improve our process of accurately recording dates of death

Dates of death on tax returns

The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) noticed that tax preparers occasionally include a deceased person’s date of death on the living spouse’s tax return. This may result in the CRA mistakenly recording the living spouse as deceased.

This error can cause major financial and emotional consequences as it can stop all benefit payments to the living person. The benefits that can significantly impact them include the Canada child benefit (CCB), the Goods and Services Tax Credit / Harmonized sales tax credit (GST/HST), the Canada Pension Plan (CPP) and Old Age Security (OAS). Additional benefits may also be affected.

Therefore, please ensure the date of death information is included only on the tax return of the deceased individual.

Social insurance numbers (SIN) on legal documents

If you are a representative settling a deceased person’s estate, the deceased’s social insurance number (SIN) must be provided with any request or document sent to the CRA. This will help ensure there are no delays in updating the appropriate records with the date of death information.