You need a CRA payroll program account before the first time you pay salary, wages, bonuses or most other remuneration to an employee — including yourself, if your corporation pays you a salary. It is an extension of your business number, not a separate registration.
Who counts as an employee
The distinction that matters is employee versus self-employed contractor, and it is not decided by what the contract calls someone. The CRA looks at who controls the work, who supplies the tools, who carries the risk of profit or loss, and how integrated the person is into the business.
Getting it wrong is expensive in one direction only. If you treat an employee as a contractor and the CRA disagrees, you owe the deductions you should have withheld — both halves of CPP and EI — plus penalties and interest.
What the account obliges you to do
Once the account is open you withhold income tax, CPP contributions and EI premiums from each payment, add the employer's share of CPP and EI, and remit the total to the CRA on a schedule the CRA assigns you.
That schedule is based on your average monthly withholding amount. Most small employers are regular remitters, due the 15th of the month after the pay. Larger payrolls remit more often — up to four times a month at the top threshold.
At year-end you issue a T4 to each employee and file a T4 summary.
The part people miss
An owner-manager paying themselves a salary from their own corporation is an employee of that corporation for payroll purposes. The account is needed even if the company has no other staff.
Dividends are different — they are not payroll and do not run through this account. Which mix suits you is a question worth asking before the year starts rather than after it ends.
Sources
- CRA — Remit payroll deductions: when to remit, due dates — modified 10 June 2026
- CRA — Employers' Guide, Payroll Deductions and Remittances (T4001) — read 17 September 2026
This guide explains published CRA rules. It is general information, not advice about your situation. Rules change — check the CRA page before acting on anything here.
