2025: Taxes due Apr 30 but CRA says May... | Income tax filing | Discussion forum

Happens regularly. They are giving you a short grace period. Just pay April 30th. Don’t make it complicated.

April 30 is the deadline to pay the income taxes due. Any later date on notices is just time to avoid additional interest being charged from the deadline.

If one didn't pay by April 30 and CRA issues the notice of assessment on May 15, the notice may say pay amount owing and interest by June 1 to avoid additional interest. One still needs to pay interest for May 1 to 15.

If one also does not pay by June 1, then one will owe interest from May 1 to when one pays instead of from May 1 to 15.

CRA likely does that to recognize that Canada Post does not deliver the notices to the taxpayer the same day they are issued.

CRA does not like to advertise it but the $25.00 rule applies.

Example Scenario:
You owe $1,000 in tax.
You file on April 30 (Penalty avoided).
You pay the full amount on May 15.
At a 7% interest rate (for 2026), 15 days of interest on $1,000 is approximately $2.88.
Result: Because $2.88 is less than $25, the CRA will likely never charge you that interest.

Therefore, you can indeed pay later following the above example, but do file by April 30 of each year.

Both. Interest will be charged after April 30, 2026. Interest will be from the calendar day of death in June 2026 for those who died in December 2025.

This is from CRA: Filing and payment due dates:

Final return

The due date to file the final return and pay a balance owing is:

• April 30 of the year following the death (if the death occurred between January 1 and October 31 inclusive)
• 6 months following the death, on the same calendar day as the date of death (if the death occurred between November 1 and December 31 inclusive)

…

Thanks Norman and Bill. So if person died on December 10, 2025 then final return and payment due is June 10, 2026. Interest would be charged starting June 11th, 2026 on any unpaid balance.

CRA confused me a bit by saying at first interest is charged after April 30 even though return is not due until June 10.

I wanted to make sure because balance owing is substantial as deceased had a significant amount in an RRSP and it's fully withdrawn without any withholding tax in year of death.

For the last few years (excluding the 2025 tax return) I Netfiled my tax return in mid to late April and received a NOA that stated my payment was not due until the first or second week of May. Despite my previous taxation training having ingrained upon my brain that I owed my tax liability no later than April 30, I paid my outstanding tax liability per the NOA and Bob Hamilton did not charge any arrears interest.

This year, I consciously decided to file my 2025 tax return in early April 2026 and thus had a payment date of the historical date of April 30th. This was related to the death of my brother in 2024 who had a medical emergency on Friday, June 28, 2024 and had planned on making his property tax payment on the last business day possible as he had not bought into post dated bill payments. Thus, he lay on the floor of his house until the next day missing his tax payment. He then spent the next month in hospital and did get released by the end of July only to suffer a fatal emergency just before Halloween in 2024 and dying in ICU in early November of said year. He had filed an appeal to his property tax penalty and interest and his appeal failed as somehow the city bureaucrats did not seem to have an ounce of human decency or reasonableness. If they had spent the month of July (except for a week break due to having contracted COVID at the disease centre/hospital) like I did, they would have surely appreciated what condition my brother was in on June 28th.

So, this experience motivated me to forgo any interest savings and just to ensure that I met the filing deadline of April 30th.

I paid my significant tax liability on April 30 through RBC online banking bill payment on April 30th which was debited from my RBC chequing account by 10 or 10:30 am EDT on April 30th.

The CRA posted this payment by May 1st at 9:30 pm EDT with a posting date of May 1st, but an effective date of April 30th. I have for many many years/decades always short paid my tax liability by $2.00 or slightly less and indeed the CRA makes an adjustment to make this tiny amount disappear. This year was no different and although earlier on May 1st the CRA was showing an implied 1 day of arrears interest (at least until they posted my April 30th RBC payment) the implied arrears interest disappeared and the $2.00 adjustment was made to bring my balance owing to a nil balance.

Now, my $2.00 habit is petty at most levels, but I am confident that I am a better allocator of resources than either the Federal government or the provincial government that I pay economic homage to. If one assumes roughly 20% of 35 million tax returns has a balance owing then if everyone with a balance owing short paid their liability by $2.00 it would total $14 million. Better in our hands than the wasteful hands of government.

I have been obligated to pay income instalments for many years now, and I also ensure that I short pay my instalments so that I avail myself of roughly 90% of the instalment interest that is less than $25. That is the CRA only charges instalment interest if it exceeds their de minimis value of $25. I have a crude spreadsheet that seems to do the trick as I underpay my quarterly instalments by amounts that create instalment interest not exceeding $25. In years where my income is forecast to be less than the previous year, instalment payments become more art than science. if you build yourself an instalment spreadsheet, dont' forget that interest is compounded daily. I made a simple shortcut for that calculation, but don't completely ignore the compound instalment interest element.

R Ed: I think you are thinking correctly out loud. I do not have the resource that you are speaking of yet. My brother was in wealth management and a lawyer by profession. He was always dismayed by the reticence of some of his friends not to recognize that a trust company was likely a better choice if you no longer had alternatives that you could impeccably trust. Even my brother, was the executor of the estate of one of his former clients and he ended up dying before her estate was wound up completely. In his professional practice and in other sundry cases, he saw what happened if you had someone with bad motives. An ill motivated executor (particularly one that is also a beneficiary of the estate) can go to town on an estate and self deal until the cows come home. The checks and balances on an executor's power are few and far between and if interested parties try to intervene the estate can quickly be eroded through legal fees.

If you take one or two or three estate lawyers out for a nice lunch, I suspect you could get a pretty good lay of the land as to who they would recommend as far as a professional trustee is concerned. My mother use to say that ageing is not for the faint of heart, and by inference living far out into an actuary's bell curve does come with its trials and tribulations!

To quote the President of Merikkka, "Praise be to Allah".

NokomisStation said
I have for many many years/decades always short paid my tax liability by $2.00 or slightly less and indeed the CRA makes an adjustment to make this tiny amount disappear.

I have often thought about doing the same, to see what would happen. Glad to see that you were actually successful in implementation. I never want to give CRA a single cent more than necessary. I was always more worried about the potential repercussions, than the minor $2 reduction. For example, I was worried that if I made an error or accidental omission on my return and more tax was assessed than I actually paid, then it might trigger some kind of penalty far greater than the miniscule $2 savings. Your anecdote gives me some reassurance of using the ploy in the future.

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Interesting story ⬆️, Bill❗

So he didn't even have any interest in doing 'Great Good', by willing his large wealth to deserving charities ... Sad

Maybe there's a hint in there somewhere, as to Why he lived his life All Alone.

Dean