You lost your tax slips. How do you rebuild a Canadian return?

Start with the slips that exist in someone else’s system, not with a blank memory. Employers, banks, and funds file copies with CRA. A My Account transcript, or a representative authorized through Represent a Client, will show many of those information slips. That is the spine of a rebuilt T1. What CRA does not have is the part you must document yourself: childcare, medical, donations, rent, union dues that never made the T4, and every business expense.

Do not invent a slip to match a deposit. A rebuilt return that uses real third-party slips and clearly marked estimates for the rest will survive a question. A return full of round numbers will not.

A practical rebuild, in order

Give each year its own envelope, even if the envelope is a folder on a phone. Mix the years and the rebuild takes three times as long.

• List the years. One page, one row per year.
• Pull CRA slips first. Autofill data is a draft, not a signed return. Check it.
• Ask the employer or the bank for a duplicate. Most will issue one.
• Bank statements reconstruct business deposits and rent paid. They do not reconstruct cash income you never deposited.
• Write “missing” next to anything you cannot support. We would rather omit a weak claim than invent one.
• Keep the envelope. A review letter asks for the same papers a year later.

What the rebuild costs

If the CRA slips cover the year and there is no business, it is a straightforward personal year: $90 plus HST. If we have to reconstruct a business from 12 months of statements, that is not the $90 file and it is not always the $650 ready-file price either. We quote it when we see the statements.

Drop whatever you have, including a screenshot of My Account slips. Partial information is enough to start. Waiting for a perfect archive is how another refund window closes.