# T4A(OAS) for tax year 2020 for father's estate???



## digitalatlas (Jun 6, 2015)

Hi,

I've been trying to sort out my late father's estate, and recently I've received not 1, not 2, but 3 T4As from Service Canada for OAS. The first two indicate tax year 2019, they came shortly after he passed last year. I had thought they were duplicates but they indicate different amounts (difference of $300), which is already confusing. These were addressed to him.

Then recently I received one addressed to his estate, but for tax year 2020. Anyone have experience with this? Is it typical to get a T4A for a future tax year? Does that mean I need to file his return again next year?? I thought 2019 would be his final tax return...confused.

Thanks


----------



## AltaRed (Jun 8, 2009)

When did your father pass away? The Final T1 return covers income and deductions to date of death. After that there will be a T3 Testamentary Trust tax return for 2019 income after date of death, plus there will another T3 return for 2020 income until the estate assets are all disbursed, and a 2021 T3 and so on until all assets and income are disbursed.


----------



## digitalatlas (Jun 6, 2015)

First week of July, 2019. I can pretty much wrap my mind around income and deductions before that point, which pretty much only included some pension income, CPP, OAS, RIF, expenses included long term care and some medication. 

The 'estate' if you will, consisted of less than a few thousand dollars, no one expected probate, no one hassled me about closing accounts, mostly on the basis that I paid the final expenses. There was no will. There were a couple of small life insurance policies that went to my mother as a named beneficiary. But otherwise, no real assets to speak of.

I briefly skimmed the T3 trust guide on CRA, and I'm not sure if it applies. I didn't set up any kind of trust, there was no reason to. There were no assets that continued to generate income afterwards. The pensions got converted to survivor pensions for my mom, for should be taxed in her hands. 

So I'm confused by this T4A(OAS) from Service Canada for the 2020 tax year. He stopped getting OAS that last month. Then I helped mom apply for an allowance for the survivor, which was finally processed in January 2020. Is this for the survivor allowance? Wouldn't she get a T4A(OAS) for the 2020 tax year, next year? Plus, the survivor's allowance is not taxable, is it not? This slip says there's a taxable pension paid for 2020...


----------



## Retired Peasant (Apr 22, 2013)

An estate I dealt with (DOD January 2019) - I received the T4A-OAS for 2018, and also 2019 in Feb 2019. i was thankful that I didn't have to wait until 2020 for get the T4A for 2019. However in your case, it doesn't make sense that a T4A(OAS) would be issued to your father for 2020 if he passed away in 2019. You should call service canada to get answers.


----------



## AltaRed (Jun 8, 2009)

The error here is that OAS should never have continued past July 2019. The amounts paid after that will need to be returned to the govt. Someone screwed up not informing Service Canada of DOD. Generally a funeral home will send a Statement of Death to Ottawa immediately to stop future payments.

It probably does not matter much about a T3 because it seems there are few, if any, taxable assets and tax owing, but a Testamentary Trust is automatically created in the form of 'Estate of X'. That is the name of the Trust that holds assets after DOD. If no income accumulated to 'Estate of X', there is no T3 to file for 2019.

Added: You need to get on the phone to Service Canada, explain the issue, make arrangements for repayment of OAS from the estate or your mother and ask them to cancel/modify the T4A slips accordingly.

Added again: There supposedly is the possibility of an OAS Survivor's Allowance for very low income survivors that I know nothing about. Whether that could apply here is worth asking Service Canada about when discussing return of father's OAS payments.


----------



## digitalatlas (Jun 6, 2015)

I'm going to call Service Canada later this week when I get a chance. I did receive the 2019 T4-OAS shortly after DOD, but again, I received a second one more recently..maybe that's more updated. I will clarify.

But the 2020 TY slip is weird. I'm guessing it's some kind of clerical error. I got my mom to sign the notification to Service Canada, but maybe the funeral home didn't send it in. But I'm sure they did because I believe all of his online access to Service Canada was revoked for this reason. Also, I closed the bank account for direct deposit at the end of the month, so there would have been nowhere to send the funds. There's nothing to repay because he didn't receive anything.

She gets survivor benefits. But seems strange that Service Canada wouldn't have sent any form of notice about payments to him or his estate (i.e. not her) until this T4A-OAS for TY 2020...


----------



## AltaRed (Jun 8, 2009)

You have us all confused. You said in a post that father stopped getting OAS last month and yet you now say he didn't get anything since ???

The 2020 T4A would say OAS was paid out for at least one month in 2020. Is the T4A for one month's worth of OAS? As an earlier poster said, an early T4A would be sent out early for estate purposes rather than waiting until next Feb.


----------



## Userkare (Nov 17, 2014)

digitalatlas said:


> I'm going to call Service Canada later this week when I get a chance.


Oh boy, I hope you have better success than I had contacting them for information about a deceased taxpayer. As estate admin, I received a statement of account last April saying I owed them $1400; no explanation given. I called, and they said that there had been an over-payment of benefits for tax years 2016 & 2017, but no details. After repeated calls, and being sent the wrong information multiple times, I finally got a letter this week that said the over-payment was because they had his wrong birth date on file, and only corrected it after he died. They were totally clueless about how I would go about getting a tax refund for the taxes paid on the returned over-payment. They directed me to call CRA, who directed me to call Service Canada.

The folks on the phone seem so friendly and helpful. They say they'll send a request to the "processing department" which apparently doesn't mean that anything will actually be done. I was told on multiple calls that "processing" did not act on the request.

I hope your results are better than mine, good luck!!!


----------



## digitalatlas (Jun 6, 2015)

Sorry if there was some confusion. So dad stopped receiving OAS and CPP in July 2019. In August, mom started getting a CPP survivor pension. Shortly after DOD, I got a T4A for OAS, TY 2019, so I didn't have to wait until actual 2019. But then recently, I received a second T4A-OAS also for TY 2019 that was different from the first one. Furthermore, I recently received another T4A for OAS for TY 2020. He did not receive anything for OAS in 2020, and yet I got the T4A.

My mom did, however, start receiving some survivor benefits from OAS because she's only 62, which started in 2020. But this should have nothing to do with him, should it not? I would think that she will receive slip next year for 2020, but it would not be for him. I don't see why I would need to file taxes for him in 2020 when he passed in 2019 and stopped receiving everything in 2019.

I hope I have better luck than Userkare. I did actually receive a bill from SC about an overpayment that was generated after CRA reassessed some old tax returns, that's what they told me anyway. I didn't dispute it and paid them to get them off my back.


----------



## AltaRed (Jun 8, 2009)

That provides more clarity. Seems SC did screw up on the 2020 tax slip. 

Surely for the 2019 tax slips you can correlate back to actual payments received by your Dad to see which one is correct. One of them should match payments received.


----------



## Retiredguy (Jul 24, 2013)

Just an idea.

Did your Dad receive any Guaranteed Income Suppliment?. GIS is not taxable but is reported on the T4 OAS slips. Its possible that based on your dad's "final" tax return that his GIS entitlement may have changed and this generated a second slip.
Obviously don't post dads name SIN or personal details but it would be helpful to post each of the box numbers on each T of the slips and the $ amount in each box.

Slip 1
Box 18 amount
Box 19 amount
Box 20 amount
Box 21 amount
Box 22 amount
Box 23 amount

Slip 2
etc.


----------



## digitalatlas (Jun 6, 2015)

Hi everyone, thanks for all the kind thoughts. So I called SC and figured it out

For the two 2019 T4A-OAS, the second one was wrong. They made an extra payment, but I had closed the bank account so there was no where to send the payment, but they were never supposed to make that extra payment anyway because it was after DOD, but they generated second T4A including the erroneous extra payment. He said to disregard the second T4A, that processing will send me a new amended T4A in the amount equal to the original first T4A I received. But at least now I know which one to report to CRA: the first one.

I agree, another step would be to add up what he received. I'd have to go to the bank and have them print out the statements, not that hard, but ultimately it's the number on the T4A that CRA receives that I care about. Even if they're off by a few dollars, I don't care at this point, I just want everything to be square and done with SC and CRA.

Regarding the 2020 T4A, apparently they didn't manage to process some benefits to which he was entitled for past years until just now, so they are sending a cheque for retro pay. But I received the T4A before getting the cheque, so that was confusing.

My question now, which the CRA guy didn't know (I wouldn't expect him to) is...I need to file a 2020 tax return. But in 2019, I'm going to indicate that he passed away. Isn't that supposed to be his final tax return?? Can I file another return in 2020, even though I will indicate that 2019 was DOD?


----------



## AltaRed (Jun 8, 2009)

The correct thing would likely be to file a 'Rights and Things' return for 'benefits earned but not received before death'.

It is exactly like a T1 return with personal deductions, but be sure to write 'Rights and Things' return at the top of the return and if you can, reference the appropriate ITA clause beside the words. I filed one of those for my mother's estate at the same time as the Final T1. 

The only question here is because it is a 2020 T4A, do you file it anyway as a 2019 return, or do you wait a year? Given no tax us likely due, it should make no difference but it may mess things up at CRA.

One option would be to phone CRA, specifically ask to talk to the Estate department, explain to them you have this T4A which will be in a 'Rights and Things' return but need direction whether to file now as 2019, or wait a year and file then. Explain you would rather do now to get it off your plate.


----------



## digitalatlas (Jun 6, 2015)

Thanks, AltaRed. You seem to know something about everything.

I went through the CRA guide for this, and indeed there's an optional return for Rights and Things that is probably what I will need to file. I will probably give CRA a call to double check the sequence, but the guide seems to suggest that I would file this the later of 1 year after DOD or 90 days after I get the NOA (I'm assuming the NOA for 2019). As such, I would file 2019 first, then file this optional return shortly thereafter. I'm not expecting anything else for 2020.

The guide says use a tax package, but obviously 2020 doesn't exist yet. I figure I'd just use 2019. I'm supposed to write "70(2)" at the top, I guess referencing the ITA clause.

https://www.canada.ca/en/revenue-ag...returns-deceased-persons-2016.html#P465_65004


----------



## AltaRed (Jun 8, 2009)

The tax calculation will result in no tax because you get to use the personal deduction to reduce tax....meaning it makes no difference whether you use 2019 or 2020 to get to zero 

My point is whether CRA will get all f*ucked up and confused if you apply a 2020 tax slip to a 2019 return package.


----------



## digitalatlas (Jun 6, 2015)

Well their guide says to write "70(2)" so I'll assume they know what that means. I would like to give them the benefit of the doubt that they're not morons and won't get confused by why I have a 2020 tax slip...surely they have dealt with this kind of thing before. It's not like a 2021 tax slip, that would be really trippy.


----------

