ROE Record of Employment: When and How to Issue
ROE is required anytime an interruption of earnings occurs. Complete 2026 guide for Canadian small business.
April 24, 2026 1 min readby TinSuite Team
canadian tax canadian-roe payroll
The Record of Employment (ROE) is issued by employers to employees who have an interruption in earnings — layoff, quit, maternity leave, sickness, etc. It determines EI benefit eligibility.
Essential details
- Required within 5 days of interruption (electronic ROE Web)
- Reports insurable hours, insurable earnings, reason for issuing
- Issued to the employee (who submits to Service Canada for EI claim)
- Reasons: shortage of work, quit, fired, maternity, parental, sick leave
- Paper ROEs are being phased out — use ROE Web
- Penalties for late filing start at $2,000
How to file correctly
1. Collect the data from your payroll records — don't reconstruct at year-end
2. Use official CRA forms — free downloads from canada.ca
3. File electronically when required (50+ slips)
4. Distribute copies to recipients by the deadline
5. Keep records for 6 years — CRA audit window
Common mistakes
- Missing the distribution deadline (last day of February for most slips)
- Using wrong box for income type
- Forgetting to remit source deductions monthly (PD7A)
- Not reconciling year-end to the T4 Summary
- Quebec employees: not filing the separate RL-1 slip
How TinSuite handles this
- Auto-generates T4, T4A, T5, RL-1 slips from your payroll data
- CPP, EI, and income tax calculated automatically
- Quebec-specific forms (QPP, QPIP) supported natively
- PD7A remittance reminders and calculations
- Bilingual EN/FR-CA interface
Start free trial → · See full Canadian payroll guide