Automatic tax filing services have opened up to thousands of Canadians as part of a national pilot project.
The Canada Revenue Agency said in a news release on Tuesday that more than 500,000 eligible Canadians were invited in July to file their 2023 tax returns by phone, online or by mail using the agency’s SimpleFile services.
The national pilot program, which was included in the 2024 federal budget, is to help low-income Canadians who have never filed a tax return or who have a gap in their filing history.
Using this service, tax returns can be filed in as little as 10 minutes, the CRA claims.
In March, the CRA said it had expanded its SimpleFile by Phone system, a program that involves agents asking simple questions over the phone to end up with a refund estimate by the end of the call.
With the new summer invites that also pilot the digital and paper options, the automatic tax filing service has been offered to at least two million Canadians so far this year.
How to file your taxes automatically
There are three different options of automatic tax filing available to Canadians eligible for the national pilot project: phone, digital and paper.
For individuals using the phone or digital service, they’ll be asked a series of simple questions and will need to confirm their personal information.
For tax filers phoning in and who have created a personal identification number, any refund that they are eligible to will be available at the end of the call.
If no PIN is created, a notice of assessment will be sent either via mail or to the person’s CRA account after their return has been processed.
Both phone and digital services are available daily from 6 a.m. to 3 a.m. Eastern time and seven days a week.
Experts and advocates have called for automatic filing, noting many vulnerable Canadians miss out on benefits to which they are entitled.
The Parliamentary Budget Officer (PBO) said in a report earlier this month that rolling out the automatic tax filing system would mean Canadians receive more than a billion dollars each year in currently unclaimed benefits from not filing their tax returns.
A 2020 report co-authored by Carleton University professors estimated that between 10 and 12 per cent of Canadians do not file their taxes. The CRA’s internal estimates peg that number closer to seven per cent.
CRA says invitations to use its SimpleFile by Phone service had already been opened up to more than 1.5 million Canadians in early 2024 who have “a lower income or a fixed income and who are in a simple tax situation that remains unchanged from year to year,” and who have filed taxes in recent years.
— with files from Global News’ Craig Lord and The Canadian Press.