File your taxes online: NETFILE eligibility

NETFILE is available to most taxpayers. However some types of tax returns can’t be sent electronically. For a list of exceptions, see “Restrictions” and “Other restrictions” below.
Tax preparation service providers can’t use NETFILE to file tax returns for their clients. They have to use EFILE.

Restrictions

There are certain types of tax returns that can’t be sent to the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) electronically:

• a return for any taxation year other than 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022 or 2023
• a tax return for another person (for example, if a taxpayer prepared a spousal/family return, each taxpayer must send his or her return separately)

You can’t use NETFILE to file your tax return if:

• you went bankrupt in 2023 or 2024 (does not include a proposal for bankruptcy)
• you are a non-resident of Canada

Review our list of other restrictions below.

You can’t use NETFILE to change personal information:

To update your personal information, see:

• Update your CRA information: change your name
• Update your CRA information: change your address

Other restrictions

The following is a list of specific situations that prevent you from filing a tax return through the NETFILE service:

• Your tax return was discounted by a third party
• You are considered a deemed resident (that is, you don’t have to pay provincial or territorial tax)
• You are filing a tax return for an individual who died in 2023 or 2024
• Your social insurance number (SIN) begins with a zero. Only newcomers to Canada with a SIN starting with zero are eligible to use NETFILE.
• You are an emigrant or non-resident of Canada. This excludes the following income and tax forms: Schedule A, Schedule B, Schedule C, income from NR4 slips, T4A-NR slips, NR-OAS slips, and NR-CPP/QPP slips, section 116 income, section 216 income, section 217 income, taxable capital gains from disposing of Canadian property if received as a non-resident, and Old Age Security Return of Income
• You are electing to defer tax on a distribution of spin-off shares by foreign corporations
• You are claiming less than the maximum federal foreign tax credit

You are reporting any of the following:

• Canadian-source income from Lloyds of London
• registered disability savings plan income in field 12500 and you are not eligible for the disability amount for self for the current tax year and for the first and second immediately preceding tax years (that is, there is no valid Form T2201, Disability Tax Credit Certificate, on record for at least 1 of these 3 years).
  Note: This exclusion is only meant to prevent an amount from being reported incorrectly in field 12500 when it should have been reported in another income field on the return
• employment income earned from an international organization
• lump-sum pension income accrued to December 31, 1971
• more than 12 sets of financial statements
• an Ontario, Saskatchewan, British Columbia, or Yukon qualifying environmental trust tax credit (may also be referred to as a mining reclamation trust tax credit)
• a statement of qualifying retroactive lump-sum payments (Form T1198)

You are claiming any one of the following:

• a federal non-business foreign tax credit for more than 3 countries
• a federal business foreign tax credit for more than 3 countries
• a deduction for scientific research and experimental development expenses
• an Alberta stock savings plan tax credit (Form T89)
• a Saskatchewan royalty tax rebate (Form T82)
• a Nova Scotia research and development tax credit recapture
• a claim that involves more than 22 children
• a Newfoundland and Labrador research and development tax credit (Form T1129)
• a deduction in field 207 that includes amounts calculated from a combination of at least 2 of the following forms:
  • Form RC269, Employee Contributions to a Foreign Pension Plan or Social Security Arrangement – Non-United States Plans or Arrangements
  • Form RC267, Employee Contributions to a United States Retirement Plan – Temporary Assignments
  • Form RC268, Employee Contributions to a United States Retirement Plan – Cross-Border Commuters

You are reporting farming income with an AgriStability and/or AgriInvest Program application which involves:

• farming income from a partnership reported on a T5013 slip or a partnership that includes a corporate partner
• a Canadian Indian reporting self-employed income which is “tax-exempt income”
• Selected financial data type 9 with more than 10 occurrences in section - Livestock inventory valuation  and/or Section - Crop inventory valuation and productive capacity from page 7 of Form T1273
• Selected financial data type 9 with more than 8 occurrences in sections -  Purchased inputs, Deferred income and receivables, and/or Accounts payable from page 7 of Form T1273

If you have to file an amended or previous-year tax return, or any other tax return that doesn’t qualify for NETFILE, go to Where to mail your paper T1 return.