Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy - March 25 Deadline for Period 7
Period 7: AUG 30 - SEPT 26 application deadline is March 25, 2021
As a Canadian employer who has seen a drop in revenue during COVID-19 pandemic, you may be eligible for a subsidy to cover part of your employee wages, retroactive to March 15, 2020. This subsidy will enable you to re-hire workers, help prevent further job losses, and ease your business back into normal operations.
This subsidy has been extended currently until Period 13: March 13, 2021. The wage subsidy does not renew automatically. Each period, you must confirm that you’re eligible and calculate your amount according to that period’s rules before you apply.
There are required revenue drops to qualify as well as top up amounts based on the revenue drop as well. Example, Period 1 had a revenue drop of 15% to qualify and then Periods 2-4 had a required drop of 30% to qualify and top up rates only came into effect if your revenue drop was greater than 50%. You can compare your revenue drop by either the corresponding month in the previous year, (General Prior Reference Period) or the average of the eligible revenue you earned in January & February 2020 (Alternative prior reference period). You must continue with the same reference period going forward.
CRA has provided a calculator to help simplify the calculations for the applications for each period. You can access that calculator here https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/subsidy/emergency-wage-subsidy/cews-calculate-subsidy-amount.html. Once you are done with the calculator, you can take those numbers and put them into your application that you can find in your My Business Account on CRA’s website under payroll and submit. You can expect to receive your funds within 5-10 business days from the date the application is submitted.
For more information on this program, please go to https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-agency/services/subsidy/emergency-wage-subsidy/cews-apply-guide.html
Online services offered by the banks and other financial institutions have made it easier to apply for some of these services, as well as the links in our news sections help you directly gain access to the Government application guidelines.