Does your business have employees aged 60 to 70?

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Beginning January 2012 the rules for CPP contributions for your employees aged 60 to 70 changed:

  • You have to deduct CPP contributions for all employees who are 60 to 65 years of age—even if the employee is receiving a CPP retirement pension and did not contribute in the past.
  • You must also deduct CPP contributions for all employees who are 65 to 70 years of age, unless they choose not to contribute to the CPP by giving you a signed and completed copy of Form CPT30, Election to Stop Contributing to the Canada Pension Plan, or Revocation of a Prior Election. They also have to send the original Form CPT30 to the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA).
  • Workers who were at least 65 years of age in 2012, receiving a CPP retirement pension, and who had chosen to stop contributing to the CPP can start contributing again if they want to, but they have to wait until the next calendar year. They will be able to do so by giving their employer another signed CPT30 and sending the original to the CRA.
  • After the month in which they turn 70 years of age, employees can no longer contribute to the CPP.

Consequences

If you, as the employer, do not deduct or remit CPP contributions to the CRA, you may have to pay your employee’s share and your share of the CPP contributions. If you do not remit the contributions to the CRA by the due date, you may also be charged penalties and interest.

More information

For more information about how the changes affect employers, go to www.cra.gc.ca/cppchanges-employers.

Disaster Recovery

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In case of a disaster such as a flood (like what happened in Calgary in 2013), fire, tornado, or earthquake, does your business have a plan in place? A plan does not need to be complicated, but should as a minimum have these two parts:

1. A method to contact all employees or staff. This is important as staff need to be informed about the occurrence of the disaster at the workplace in a timely manner. They would also need to know if, when, and where to return to work.

If your company is small enough, direct phone contact of employees may be the best method so ensure a current employee phone number list is maintained and is readily available. If you have a large staff, an alternate method could be social media. For example staff could be told that in case of a disaster, they should check the company’s Facebook or Instagram account for updates.

2. Alternate arrangements to recommence business operations as quickly as possible. This is important as any lost productivity for the business will mean a potential loss in revenue and customers.

A plan should be in place that if the original business premises is unusable, there should be arrangements for an alternate location for the business to operate. Having a functioning data backup system is essential for this part of the plan as well as having an alternate location for the business to operate.

 Additional Planning Resources

For more detailed help on creating a disaster recovery plan your company could consider using an external consultant who specialize in disaster recovery planning or online resources such as  The Disaster Recovery Guide at www.disaster-recovery-guide.com