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Use the slips you have

If the T4 you were issued is wrong, it’s important to let your employer know right away so it can be reviewed and amended, if necessary.

In an email to the Citizen, CRA said, “If an individual is expecting an amended T4 with their correct annual earnings but has not received it by the April 30, 2018 tax filing deadline, the CRA will not consider them to have filed a false return if they file using the most recent 2017 T4 received from their employer. The CRA will reassess the individual’s return when an amended T4 is issued by the employer at a later time.”

“But my T4 is wrong. And the revised T4 is wrong. And the …”

Johanna Jenkins, a fishery officer based in Nanaimo, B.C., whose Phoenix problems were described in an earlier Ottawa Citizen story, knew her 2016 T4 was wrong and stayed wrong even after several attempts to have it fixed.

Jenkins put all her pay stubs in a spreadsheet and calculated her own values for her pay and deductions. It’s “pretty basic math,” she said.

Jenkins used her official T4 numbers in her return, but filed by paper so she could include a letter that disputed the official T4 information and added the values from her own calculations. She backed it up with copies of her paystubs and emails with her employer about her pay issues.

“Pay Centre issued me a T4 which over-reported my income and under reported the taxes they had deducted from my pay. I was lucky (because) I could prove it since my paystubs for the year all appeared to be based on actual numbers. I was paid wrong, but at least what I did get paid was reflected on my biweekly paystubs.”