🇨🇦 T4 Year-End Process EoY Guide

Before starting the T4 process, review the 2025 Payroll Year-End Preparation Guide to ensure all prerequisites are complete. 

Guide Link: Year-End & New-Year Preparation Guide

📅 Key Dates & Requirements:

Roles:  Payroll Administrator |  Payroll Administrator - Unlocked | Administrator

1. Start the T4 Year-End Process

Follow these steps:

1. Go to the Payroll menu.
2. Scroll to the Canada section.
3. Select "T4 EOY Summary."
4. Click "Start Process."

This opens your T4 setup page.

2. Review and Complete Company Information

System Note: Data Population

If any company information fields appear blank or incomplete—such as a missing address—this indicates that company details have not been fully configured at the source. Please ensure all settings under Company Information are complete to avoid filing errors.

Use the table below to verify where your data is pulled from and how to make corrections if necessary.

Managing Multiple CRA Payroll (RP) Accounts

If your organization operates under more than one CRA payroll account, you must treat each one as a distinct filing process.

• Individual Processing: The T4 process must be completed separately for each RP account.

• Selection: Ensure you select the correct RP account at the start of the workflow.

• Employee Filtering: Only employees assigned to the selected RP account will appear in the current T4 summary.

• Unique Outputs: Each account generates its own T4 Summary, individual employee T4s, and CRA XML files.

• Repeat: Once finished with one account, repeat the full T4 process for each additional RP account.

Note: When returning to the T4 End-of-Year Summary dashboard, always double-check that the Tax Year and RP Account are correctly selected before editing or regenerating files.

Related Resource: [Section III] Pre-T4 Employee Data Validation 

4. Generate the T4 Summary

Click "Create EOY Summary."

The system will:

• Generate all employee T4 slips
• Produce the employer T4 Summary
• Create the XML file
• Validate data based on CRA requirements

A processing screen will display status updates.

5. Review and Correct Errors

Action Required: If the system detects validation issues during the T4 Year-End process, a warning icon will appear on the summary. These errors must be resolved to ensure the CRA XML file structure is valid for filing and to successfully create an End-of-Year (EOY) Summary.

Resolution Steps

1. Identify the Issue Hover over the warning icon ( ⚠️ ) to view the detailed error message in a tooltip.

   • Reference: Common T4 Errors

2. Correct the Data Navigate to the relevant record to fix the underlying issue (e.g., employee profiles, payroll configuration, or company details).

3. Validate Changes Once the data is corrected, return to the summary to ensure the warning icon has disappeared.

6. Review & Validate T4 Data

7. Making Corrections After the EOY Summary Is Created

If you need to update information after the End-of-Year (EOY) Summary has been generated—such as adjusting an employee’s dental code, pension adjustment (PA), —you do not need to restart the entire process.

Resources: Updating Employees' T4 Data in the EOY Summary

8. Review Final T4 Files

After successful validation, your final T4 documents will be available for review. Before submitting to the CRA or distributing slips to employees, you must perform a final audit to ensure data integrity.

• Purpose: Confirm payroll deductions align with CRA remittances.
• If discrepancies appear, review remittance entries and correct them before filing.

Calculations section showing remittance totals.

• Spot-check employees with higher earnings or complex pay.
• Compare employee-level totals to the T4 Summary amounts.

 T4 Mapping per Employee (grid view).
 

T4 Summary PDF comparison.

3. Download and Audit Documents

Download the following files to verify the data one last time before submission:

• T4 Summary PDF: A consolidated report of your company’s total T4 data.

• Employee T4 PDFs: The individual slips that will be distributed to your staff.

• XML File: The specific format required for electronic CRA filing.

[!CHECK] Final Sign-off: Ensure the totals on your T4 Summary PDF match your internal year-end payroll reports before you upload the XML file to the CRA's represent-a-client portal.

9. Filing Your T4 XML With CRA (After January 12)

To file electronically:

1. Download your T4 XML file.
2. Go to the CRA Internet File Transfer portal.
3. Log in using My Business Account or Represent a Client.
4. Upload your XML file.
5. Review the confirmation message.
6. Save or print the CRA confirmation for your records.

T4 XML submissions will only be accepted starting January 13.

10. Distribute T4 Slips to Employees

⚠️ Action Required: Ensure All Employees Are Active for T4 Distribution

Before distributing T4 slips, you must ensure that all relevant employees are set to Active status within the system.  

Resource: How to Re-Activate Employees Using CSV

You can distribute T4 slips in two ways:

♻️ Recommended Method: Consented Email 

For terminated employees who no longer have system access, the preferred and most environmentally friendly method is email distribution, provided explicit electronic consent was obtained prior to their departure.

Important Compliance Note

⚠️  CRA Consent Requirement for T4 Slips

If you distribute by email, you must receive consent from employees or recipients, in writing or in electronic format, before sending the slips by email. Consider incorporating this as part of your Onboarding or Off-boarding process. 

11. How Employees Access Their T4s

Employees can retrieve their T4 slips through:

Employee Center Role |  Path: Payroll Documents > Payment Summary 

ZEP Portal

If your company uses ZEP, employees can download their T4 under Documents or Tax Documents.

• Content under this section is under review and will be published soon

12. Returning to the T4 Process Later or Amend after CRA Filing

If you need to resume processing later:

1. Go to Payroll
2. Select "T4 EOY Summary : List"
3. Filter by the correct tax year
4. Open the summary in View or Edit mode

From here, you can:

• Correct employee data
• Regenerate the XML file
• Download PDFs
• Distribute or email T4s
• Restart the process if necessary (See Section 14: How to Delete a T4 Summary & Start Over)

Related Articles: Link (How to Amend a T4 after CRA Filing - Link to be added)

• We are enhancing this section to improve clarity and value. Updated content will be available shortly. 

13. How to Delete a T4 Summary & Start Over

If T4s were generated but not yet completed, and no file has been submitted to the CRA, the best approach for making significant adjustments is to delete the current summary and start over.

When to Restart

• You need to perform bulk data updates across many employees.

• You have significant re-mapping to do for pay components.

• You realized a major payroll adjustment was missing from the reporting year.

Required Action: Create a Support Case

To ensure data integrity, the EOY Summary cannot be deleted directly by users. In order to delete the EOY Summary and restart the process, you must create a support case for our technical team to reset the file.

Completion Checklist

Confirm the following steps have been performed before considering your T4 process complete: