GST/HST Credit Decoded
Canada's tax-free quarterly sales-tax credit, in plain English

Changes and overpayments

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A cardboard box Photo: Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.
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An apartment building under construction in Fernie Photo: Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 3.0.

Your credit is not fixed for the benefit year. The CRA recalculates it whenever the facts behind it change, and the recalculation can raise, lower, or stop your payments. Knowing the triggers in advance is what keeps a small change from becoming an overpayment letter months later.

The six recalculation triggers

The CRA lists six events that trigger a recalculation of the benefit:

  1. A reassessment of your tax return, or your spouse's or common-law partner's return, that changes adjusted family net income.
  2. An eligible child turns 19.
  3. Your marital status changes.
  4. The number of eligible children in your care changes.
  5. A recipient dies.
  6. You start, or stop, sharing custody of a child.

Marital status deserves a closer look, because it changes two things at once: the base blocks (a spouse adds a $445 block and removes the single supplement) and the income (two incomes are combined into adjusted family net income). A marriage or new common-law relationship can therefore raise the maximum while also raising the income measured against it, and the net effect is not obvious until the CRA recalculates. Separation works in reverse: the spouse block disappears, the single supplement may appear, and only your own income counts. Tell the CRA promptly in either case, through CRA My Account or by phone, rather than waiting for the next July recalculation.

Moves, banking, and address changes

A move within Canada does not change the federal formula, but it changes two things that affect payment: your province of residence for any provincial layer (see the provincial credits page), and where cheques and notices are sent. Update your address with the CRA before a move if you can, and update direct deposit details at the same time. A payment sent to a closed bank account or an old address is not lost, but recovering it takes a phone call and weeks of waiting that a five-minute update would have prevented. The same applies to a name change after marriage: make sure the name on your CRA account matches the name on your return and your bank account.

Overpayments: how they happen and how they are recovered

An overpayment happens when the CRA paid you more than your recalculated entitlement: typically because income was revised upward on reassessment, a child turned 19 mid-year, or a marital change was reported late. The CRA recovers the excess, usually by reducing future benefit payments rather than by demanding a lump sum, and the recovery shows on your statement of account in CRA My Account. If you disagree with the recalculation, the notice explains the figures the CRA used; check them against your return first, because most disputes turn on a line-23600 figure or a child's date of birth, both of which are easy to verify. If the CRA's figures are right and the overpayment stands, you can discuss a repayment arrangement rather than ignoring the balance: an ignored balance can be recovered from a future tax refund or benefit payment without further warning.

Report first, argue later. Reporting a change promptly never makes an overpayment worse; it stops it growing. The expensive mistake is waiting until July in the hope that the annual recalculation will quietly absorb the change. It will absorb it — by converting months of small overpayments into one larger balance.

Death of a recipient

When a recipient dies, the CRA stops future payments, and any amount already paid for a period after death becomes an overpayment of the estate. The surviving spouse or the estate's representative should notify the CRA and file the deceased person's final return; the survivor's own entitlement is then recalculated on their own circumstances, which may include the single supplement if they are now a single adult. This is a painful administrative task at a difficult time, and it is worth doing promptly, because the estate's liability grows with every quarterly payment that arrives after death.

A checklist for every change

When anything on the trigger list happens, do three things in order: update CRA My Account (address, marital status, children, banking), check whether the change affects a provincial credit as well as the federal one, and keep the CRA notice that follows so you can compare its annual entitlement against the tables on this site. If the new figure matches the tables for your new household and income, the recalculation is correct even if the number is smaller than you hoped. If it does not match, the notice's income figure is the first place to look.

General information only. This page explains the GST/HST credit in plain English. It is not legal, financial, or tax advice, and it cannot decide whether you qualify. Only the Canada Revenue Agency can decide a claim. Amounts and rules change over time — the figures here are for the July 2026 to June 2027 benefit year, based on the 2025 tax return — so always confirm the current position with the CRA before you act on it. Contact: hello [at] tapetoolhq.com.