Open navigation

Import Tax Slip Pension Adjustments

If your organization has an employer-sponsored registered pension plan (RPP) or a deferred profit-sharing plan (DPSP), you’ll need to include a pension adjustment on your tax slips. There are two ways to create pension adjustments (PA) for your employee’s tax slips:

  • Create a formula that calculates the PA.

  • Import the PA.

This article will guide you through importing the PA. If you calculate your PAs using a formula, go to Pension Adjustment Formulas for more information.

Important Information
Be sure to extract your employee data before importing the adjustments. If you extract or re-extract after you’ve imported the PAs, it will overwrite them, and you’ll need to import the PAs again.

Benefits of importing your PAs:

  • You can import adjustments for multiple employees at once.

  • You can re-import the adjustments in a single step if you need to extract your tax slips again.

  • You can import adjustments numerous times and add them to the existing tax slip data.

Additional Information
All the pension plan numbers will be included in your transmission file to the CRA, as per their specifications.

If you don’t need to import pension adjustments, skip to the next step in the tax slip checklist: Review, Modify, and Add Employee Tax Slips.

How Many Import Files Do You Need

If you’re importing information for employees in different tax slip groups, you’ll need to create a separate import file for each group. Additionally, you’ll need to create an additional import file if you’re replacing and updating information in Avanti.

For example, you’ll need to create two import files if you have employees who need updated information in Avanti for boxes 20 and 52 but also need to replace the pension plan number in box 50. You’ll need to create two import files for each tax slip group.

How to Set up the File

The first three columns of the file contain the information to identify the employee, the tax slip, and the employee’s province of employment.

The remaining columns identify the tax slip box and then the tax slip box amount. You can include as many tax slip boxes as you wish for each employee by entering the tax slip box in the next column, then the tax slip amount in the column after that, etc.

You can either have the amounts in this file replace the existing tax slip amount in Avanti or add to Avanti’s current amount.

Additional Information 
The import only affects the tax slip boxes in the import file; the import doesn’t update any boxes that aren’t included in the file.

Do you want to import a PA for an employee who doesn’t have an Employee Profile in Avanti? Go to Importing Your Employee Tax Slip Information for more details.

How to Identify the Employee in the Import File

If you’re importing pension adjustments for employees with an Employee Profile in Avanti, this will identify the employee and the tax slip you’re importing.

If you’re importing an RPP or DPSP registration number, you must create two import files; one file with boxes 20 and 52, the other file with box 50.

Step 1: Save a copy of the import file provided by your pension provider. If the file isn’t a .csv, .xls, or .xlsx file, please save it as a .csv or Excel file.

Step 2: Adjust the file so T4 is in Column A. This identifies the type of tax slip you’re creating or adjusting.

Step 3: Adjust the file so Column B is the employee number.

Additional Information 
If you allow alphanumeric employee numbers, you must ensure the employee number is nine characters and includes all leading zeros.

Step 4: Adjust the file so Column C features the two-character abbreviation of the province for the tax slip. Here is a list of the valid province abbreviations.

  • AB Alberta

  • BC British Columbia

  • MB Manitoba

  • ON Ontario

  • NB New Brunswick

  • NL Newfoundland & Labrador

  • NS Nova Scotia

  • NT Northwest Territories

  • NU Nunavut

  • PE Prince Edward Island

  • QC Quebec

  • SK Saskatchewan

  • YT Yukon Territory

Step 5: Save your import file. This is the file to import boxes 20 and 52.

Step 6: If you’re importing an RPP or DPSP registration number into box 50, save another copy of your import file and indicate in the file name that it’ll import box 50.

Congratulations! You’re all done adjusting the file to identify your employees and are ready to add the tax slip boxes.

How to Add Box 20 and 52 to the Import File

Update the import file to include your adjustments for boxes 20 and 52.

Step 1: Open the file to import boxes 20 and 52.

Step 2: Enter 20 in column D for each employee with RPP contributions. This indicates column E is your employee’s RPP contributions.

Additional Information 
This should be on the same row as the employee information added in the How to Identify the Employee in the Import File section 
above.

Step 3: Adjust the file so the box 20 amount is in column E.

Additional Information 
The amount always populates the tax slip box in the column to its left.

Step 4: Adjust the file so 52 is in column F for each employee with a pension adjustment. This indicates column G is your employee’s pension adjustment.

Step 5: Adjust the file so the box 52 amount is in column G. This is the amount of their pension adjustment.

Step 6: Remove all other columns from the import file.

Step 7: Save the file.

How to Add Box 50 to the Import File

Box 50 should be imported in its own import file, as it can affect boxes 20 and 52. Do not add box 50 to the file that imports boxes 20 and 52. If you don’t need to import box 50, skip to the How To Import the PA File With Box 20 and 52 section below.

If some of your employees are members of multiple pension plans, include the pension registration number for the larger amount.

Step 1: Open the file to import box 50.

Step 2: Adjust the file so 50 is in column D for each employee needing an RPP or DPSP registration number imported.

Step 3: Adjust the file so the RPP or DPSP registration number is in column E.

Step 4: Remove all other columns from the import file.

Step 5: Save the file.

You’re now ready to import your PA import files.

How To Import the PA File With Box 20 and 52

Be sure to extract your employee data before importing the adjustments. If you extract or re-extract after you’ve imported the PAs, it will overwrite them, and you’ll need to re-import.

Step 1: Open Import External Tax Slip Data in the Avanti Desktop Application.
By default, this can be found in Canadian Payroll >> Tax Slip Processing.

Step 2: Select 2023 in the Tax Year if it’s not already selected.

Step 3: Select the correct group in the Tax Slip Group.

Step 4: Select the location of your import file from My PC or OneDrive.

Step 5: Select the arrow to the right of the Import File.

Step 6: Navigate to the location of the file you created and select the file. Then select Open.

Additional information 
If you are importing a CSV file, you will need to change the file type to CSV files (*.csv) for the file to be visible.

Step 6: Select Add to existing to add the amounts in the import file to the amounts in Avanti tax slips.

Additional Information 
Only the tax slip boxes which are included in the import data will be affected by the import. The import will not change any boxes that aren’t included in the import file.

Step 7: If rows at the top of your import file don’t contain information to import, specify the number of rows the import should skip in Header Lines.

Step 8: Select OK.

Step 9: If the import file is valid, please confirm you’d like to import the file by selecting Yes.

  • If any errors prevent the file from importing, a message will display in the results. Adjust the file, then import the adjusted file again.

Step 10: Once the import finishes, select Print to keep a copy of the results for reference. From here, you can either print or save it as a file.

How to Import the PA File with Box 50

Be sure to extract your employee data before importing the adjustments. If you extract or re-extract after you’ve imported the PAs, it will overwrite your PAs, and you’ll need to import them again.

If you don’t need to import box 50, congratulations! You’re all done importing your PAs. You’re now ready for the next step in the tax slip checklist: Review, Modify, and Add Employee Tax Slips.

Step 1: Open Import External Tax Slip Data in the Avanti Desktop Application.
By default, this can be found in Canadian Payroll >> Tax Slip Processing.

Step 2: Select 2023 in the Tax Year if it’s not already selected.

Step 3: Select the correct group in the Tax Slip Group.

Step 4: Select the location of your import file from My PC or OneDrive.

Step 5: Select the arrow to the right of the Import file.

Step 6: Navigate to the location of the file you created and select the file. Then select Open.

Additional information 
If you are importing a CSV file, you will need to change the file type to CSV files (*.csv) for the file to be visible.

Step 7: Select Replace to remove the amount in box 50 from the box in Avanti and replace it with the import file registration number.

Additional Information 
The import only affects the tax slip boxes in the import file; the import doesn’t update any boxes that aren’t included in the file.

Step 8: Deselect Allow Zero Amounts, if selected.

Step 9: If rows at the top of your import file don’t contain information to import, specify the number of rows the import should skip in Header Lines.

Step 10: Select OK.

Step 11: If the import file is valid, please confirm you’d like to import the file by selecting Yes.

  • If any errors prevent the file from importing, a message will display in the results. Adjust the file, then import the file again.

Step 12: Once the import finishes, select Print to keep a copy of the results for reference. From here, you can either print or save it as a file.

Congratulations! You’re all done importing your PAs. You’re now ready for the next step in the tax slip checklist: Review, Modify, and Add Employee Tax Slips.

Did you find it helpful? Yes No

Send feedback
Sorry we couldn't be helpful. Help us improve this article with your feedback.