Tax season frequently asked questions

Here are answers to your most frequently-asked questions at tax time.

Contributions made in the first 60 days of 2024 can be claimed (deducted) for the 2023 or 2024 tax year, but not for both years. Whether you're claiming the contribution for 2023 or 2024, it must be entered as a contribution on your 2023 tax return.

For each contribution made to your RRSP from January 1–February 29, 2024, you will receive a contribution receipt 3 weeks after the contribution is deposited to your account.

When a contribution receipt is available in your account, we’ll let you know by email and by notification on your mobile device. Note: your contribution slip may not appear in your account until the end of the day when you receive the notification. 

To download the contribution receipt, log in to Questrade from any web browser, go to Reports > Tax slips, select the Account #, and click under 2023.

For a spousal RRSP, it is usually the contributing spouse who makes contributions to the RRSP on behalf of the account holder, so the contributing spouse receives the contribution receipt and tax deduction in their name. The receipt will still be found in the account holder’s Tax slips page.

Whoever is identified in your Questrade account, under Account management, as the contributing spouse will be issued the contribution receipt.

To change the contributor for a spousal RRSP:

1. Log in to Questrade from any web browser
2. In the top navigation bar, go to Accounts > Account Management
3. From the menu, select Account management
4. On the Account management page, under Spousal contributions, click Change

Important note: Once a tax slip is issued, if the name on the slip is incorrect it cannot be amended to show the correct name.

You will not receive a tax slip for your Tax-Free Savings Account (TFSA). This is because contributions to a TFSA are not tax-deductible, and withdrawals and income are generally tax-free.

Note: For U.S. persons with income from U.S.-sourced investments, they may receive a 1099-DIV or a 1099-INT.

The TFSA contribution limit for 2024 is $7,000.

Your TFSA contribution limit for 2024 is this year’s new contribution amount ($7,000), plus any previously unused contribution limit, plus any withdrawals made in 2023.

To track your Questrade TFSA contributions:

1. Log in to Questrade
2. Go to Accounts > Reports in the top navigation bar
3. Select Account activity

On this page you can filter by activity type, and if you select deposits only, you can easily track your total contributions to your TFSA.

For registered accounts, Questrade reports contributions and withdrawals for the 2023 tax year to the CRA as follows:

• TFSA, FHSA  - February 29, 2024 for both contributions and withdrawals
• RRSP - February 29, 2024 for withdrawals and April 30, 2024 for contributions
• RRIF - February 29, 2024 for withdrawals

Note: while these are the timeframes for us to report this to the CRA, the information may not appear in your CRA account right away as the CRA's processing times may vary.

We do not provide a statement for profits and losses in your Margin account during the 2023 tax year. You use the following tax documents—along with your own records you keep to track your buys and sells—to help you determine the profits or losses for securities you have sold during 2023:

• Trading Summary - reports all security trading (both buys and sells) in your account during 2023
• T5008 (Statement of Securities Transactions) - reports the amount paid or credited to you for securities you sold, or deemed to have sold, during the 2023 tax year

For more information, consult with your tax or accounting advisor.

The Trading Summary reports all security trading (both buys and sells) in your account during the 2023 tax year.

The T5008 (Statement of Securities Transactions) reports the amount paid or credited to you for securities you sold during the 2023 tax year.

Neither the Trading Summary or the T5008 provides the actual profits and losses realized during the 2023 tax year. You use these documents, along with your own records you keep to track your buys and sells, to help you determine the capital gains or losses for securities you have sold during the year.

For more information, consult with a tax or accounting advisor.

The T5008 (for Quebec residents: T5008/RL-18 consolidated)  is also called Statement of Securities Transactions. It reports the amount paid or credited to you for securities you sold during the tax year.
The T5008 differs from the Trading Summary as the T5008 only shows sales, and the Trading Summary includes both purchases and sales.
On this tax slip:

• The amount in Box 21 is the money you received for selling a security
• The amount in Box 20 is the cost or book value (cost base) of the security that was sold. The cost base is the original value of an asset

The amount shown in Box 20 may or may not represent the actual adjusted cost base (ACB). To make sure you are accurately reporting capital gains and losses in your tax return, it is your responsibility to keep track of your ACB for each of your securities and, if necessary, consult with a tax or accounting advisor.

If you are seeing a 0 in Box 20, it can be for any of the following reasons:

• The security was transferred in from another institution and the cost base was never passed on to us. In this case, you will need to check your account statement with your previous broker
• You did not initially pay for the security; for example, a company for which you hold securities has issued rights to its shareholders
• A sale was a short-sell transaction, where we are unable to determine an accurate cost base

We strongly recommend keeping track of the transactions in your account. If you find your records differ from the information we provide in the T5008, you will need to work with your accountant and CRA to validate this amount, and you may need to make adjustments to it to determine the adjusted cost base for tax reporting purposes.

For more information, visit the CRA website.

Generally, we do not make amendments to this amount in the T5008.

In addition to the T5008, you have access to all of the transactions in your account dating back to 2019. Here is how you can access these transactions:

1. Log in to Questrade
2. From Accounts, go to Reports > Account Activity
3. At the top of the Account Activity page, to the right of Date range, select your Individual Margin account.
4. Select the date range of December 28, 2022—December 27, 2023  for all settled trades during the 2023 tax year
   • (This date range takes into consideration the 2-day trade settlement period)
5. Under Activity types, click Trades, and if you have any, also click Dividend Reinvestment
6. To the right of Date range, click Export to Excel.
   • This creates an Excel file that saves your trades and dividend reinvestment information to help you determine the ACB for each security

Interest income paid to you on your investments will show up on the T5 (Statement of Investment Income) if it is greater than $50. Interest income paid by you shows up only on the Income Summary.

Note: For interest income that is less than $50, you may not receive a T5; however, you are still required to report this on your tax return.

Form T1135 (Foreign Income Verification Statement) reports the total cost of all specified foreign property that exceeds $100,000 CDN. This includes funds held in stocks and shares of a non-resident corporation.

We do not issue form T1135 to customers at tax time. This is because, to fully complete the T1135, you need to provide income reporting from ALL financial institutions where foreign investments are held. We can only provide information on foreign investments held at Questrade.

To determine your foreign holdings at Questrade, along with the gains and/or income you received from them during the calendar year, you may use a combination of the following:

• Your account statements
• Statement of Investment Income (T5, RL-3, NR4)
• Trading Summary

For more information about Form T1135, visit the CRA website, Questions and answers about Form T1135.

Note: The information in this blog is for educational purposes only and should not be used or construed as financial or investment advice by any individual. Information obtained from third parties is believed to be reliable, but no representations or warranty, expressed or implied, is made by Questrade, Inc., its affiliates or any other person to its accuracy.