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Canada Pension Plan (CPP) and Employment Insurance (EI) -> Recovering overpayments of CPP or EI

How to recover overpayments of CPP contributions or EI premiums

If you deduct excessive Canada Pension Plan (CPP) contributions or Employment Insurance (EI) premiums from employees, this means you have also overpaid the employer portion of these costs.

In order to remedy this, for overpayments in the current calendar year, you can reduce your current year remittances by the total amount overpaid (including employer portion), and refunding to employees the excess that you have collected from them.

For overpayments in a prior calendar year, you can apply for a refund (within time limits) by completing the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) form PD24 - Application for a refund of overdeducted CPP contributions or EI premiums.

The following time limits apply for filing the application for a refund:

Sometimes, wages are non-pensionable, which means CPP contributions are not payable on the earnings.  Some wages are non-insurable, which means EI premiums are not payable on the earnings.  If an overpayment is related to non-pensionable or non-insurable earnings, a ruling may be required from CRA.  To request a ruling, see their web page How CPP/EI rulings work.  A ruling must be requested no later than June 30th of the year following the year to which the ruling relates.