A T5, formally the Statement of Investment Income, shows up in late winter from a bank or a broker and reports what your non-registered accounts paid you last year. If you have a savings account, a GIC, or an investment account outside a TFSA or an RRSP, you may get one for interest, dividends, or other investment income.
It is a small slip with a confusing layout, and the confusion is not your fault. The box numbers do not run in the order you would expect, and a large number of Canadian guides, including an earlier version of this page, describe them the wrong way round. This version was rebuilt against the CRA's own T5 guide.
What a T5 is, and what it is not
A T5 reports taxable investment income from a non-registered account. The CRA lists it alongside the T3 (trust income) and the T5013 (partnership income) as the slips that usually carry this kind of income.
What it is not is the source of your obligation. This trips people up every year. The slip is how an institution reports to the CRA and to you. Your duty to report the income exists whether or not a slip ever arrives. Interest and other investment income form part of your total income and must be reported on your return, full stop.
Investment income earned inside a TFSA or an RRSP is tax sheltered, so it is not the taxable investment income this slip is about. That difference is the whole reason a high interest savings balance is generally better off inside a TFSA than in a taxable account, a point we get into below.
The T5 box by box
The top part of the slip has pre-numbered boxes. These are the ones almost everyone actually needs:
| Box | What it is | Where it goes |
|---|---|---|
| Box 10 | Actual amount of dividends other than eligible dividends. Typically dividends from a Canadian private or small business corporation | Feeds box 11, not entered directly |
| Box 11 | Taxable amount of dividends other than eligible dividends. Box 10 plus the taxable gross-up, which is 15% of box 10 for dividends paid in 2019 or later | Line 12000 and line 12010 |
| Box 12 | Dividend tax credit for dividends other than eligible. Equals 9/13 of the taxable gross-up, or 9.0301% of box 11, for dividends paid in 2019 or later | Line 40425 |
| Box 13 | Interest from Canadian sources. Bank account interest, GIC interest, bond interest, interest on a brokerage account | Line 12100 |
| Box 24 | Actual amount of eligible dividends. Typically dividends from Canadian public corporations | Feeds box 25, not entered directly |
| Box 25 | Taxable amount of eligible dividends. Box 24 plus the taxable gross-up, which is 38% of box 24 for dividends paid in 2012 and later | Line 12000 |
| Box 26 | Dividend tax credit for eligible dividends. Equals 15.0198% of box 25, or 6/11 of the taxable gross-up, for 2012 and later | Line 40425 |
The line mappings above come straight from the CRA. Line 12000 takes the total of T5 box 11 and box 25. Line 12010, which captures dividends other than eligible on their own, takes box 11 only. The federal dividend tax credit at line 40425 is the total of the amounts in T5 boxes 12 and 26.
The "Other information" boxes
Below the numbered boxes, the T5 has an "Other information" area with blank boxes. The CRA is explicit that these are not pre-numbered like the top of the slip: the issuer writes in a code and an amount. Codes cover other income from Canadian sources (code 14), foreign income (15), foreign tax paid (16), royalties from Canadian sources (17), capital gains dividends (18), and accrued income from annuities (19). If more than three codes apply to you, the issuer has to use an additional T5 slip.
Most people with a savings account and a couple of Canadian stocks will never see anything in this area. If you do have entries here, particularly foreign income and foreign tax paid, the treatment gets specific enough that it is worth checking the CRA's page for the relevant line rather than trusting a general table, and we are not going to guess at line numbers we have not verified.
The box mix-up that catches nearly everyone
Here is the thing worth remembering, because it is genuinely counterintuitive and it is wrong in a lot of published guides.
Why it matters practically: eligible dividends carry a bigger gross-up and a bigger tax credit, and are taxed at a lower effective rate than dividends other than eligible. If you transcribe box 24 into the box 10 field in your tax software, you will report the wrong taxable amount and claim the wrong credit. Tax software handles this correctly if you enter the slip as it is laid out, so the real advice is simple: enter the boxes by their printed numbers and do not try to be clever about which is which.
One more detail from the CRA guide worth knowing if you hold shares in a credit union: dividends a credit union pays to a member on a share that is not listed on a designated stock exchange are treated as interest and belong in box 13, not in the dividend boxes.
How the gross-up and the dividend tax credit work
Canadian dividend income is taxed differently from other income because the corporation has already paid corporate tax on those profits before distributing them. The gross-up and credit system exists to stop that income being taxed twice. The sequence:
- You receive an actual dividend, box 10 or box 24.
- It gets grossed up to a taxable amount, box 11 or box 25. The gross-up is 15% for dividends other than eligible (2019 and later) and 38% for eligible dividends (2012 and later). The grossed-up figure roughly represents the pre-corporate-tax income.
- You pay tax on the grossed-up amount at your marginal rate.
- You claim a dividend tax credit, box 12 or box 26, which partly offsets the extra tax the gross-up created.
The net effect is that eligible dividends are taxed at a lower effective rate than interest income, which is what makes Canadian dividend paying stocks relatively tax efficient in a non-registered account. Note the gross-up also inflates your reported net income, which can quietly affect income-tested benefits even though the credit brings the tax back down. That is a real and frequently missed side effect of holding dividends in a taxable account.
There is also a provincial or territorial dividend tax credit at line 61520, calculated on the worksheet for your province, and the amount varies depending on where you lived at the end of the year.
No slip arrived. Do you still report it?
Yes, and this is the single most common honest mistake on Canadian returns.
So if you earned $30 of interest across a couple of savings accounts, no T5 will arrive and the $30 still belongs on line 12100. The practical trap is that small amounts scattered across several institutions can add up while none of them individually crosses the threshold that prompts a slip. If you have money in three or four places, check each account's annual interest summary rather than waiting for paper.
One more that people miss entirely: you must also report the interest the CRA itself paid you on an income tax refund, as shown on your notice of assessment or reassessment. Yes, the refund interest is taxable income.
You may also receive several T5 slips, one from each institution where you hold non-registered accounts. Enter each separately in your tax software rather than adding them together. The CRA does not allow issuers to combine amounts across slips for the same recipient either, outside of a corporate amalgamation, so if three slips arrive from the same place that is normal and each one is entered.
Why interest is the worst income to hold in a taxable account
Interest income, box 13, is taxed at your full marginal rate, exactly like employment income. A thousand dollars of GIC interest is treated the same as a thousand dollars of salary. There is no gross-up, no credit, no preferential treatment of any kind.
Compare that with eligible dividends, which get the credit, or capital gains, which have their own treatment. Interest is the least tax efficient investment income there is, and it is also the kind most Canadians hold the most of, because it is what savings accounts and GICs pay.
The practical consequence is straightforward. If you are holding a meaningful cash balance and you have TFSA room, the interest is generally better earned inside the TFSA, where it is sheltered and generates no T5 and no line 12100 entry at all. That is not a loophole, it is the intended design of the account.
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Tax efficiency only matters after you have stopped paying for the privilege of holding your own money. If your day-to-day cash is sitting in an account with a monthly fee, that fee is a guaranteed loss that no tax treatment fixes. KOHO is a no-fee spending and savings app that opens with identity verification and no credit check, and it is a reasonable place for the cash you need access to rather than the cash you are investing. It is not a bank and it is not a tax product. Read what it does before you decide.
See a no-fee accountWhen T5 slips arrive
The CRA requires a filer to file a T5 information return by the last day of February following the calendar year the return applies to. If that date lands on a Saturday, Sunday or a public holiday recognized by the CRA, the return is on time if it is received or postmarked on or before the next business day.
That deadline is on the institution, not on you, and it is why slips for the previous tax year turn up in late February. If you are missing one you expect, most institutions post slips in online banking before the paper copy arrives, and your CRA My Account will show slips the CRA has received. Do not delay filing over a slip for an amount you can verify yourself from your own statements.
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Frequently asked questions
Yes. The CRA states that you may not receive a T5 slip if the total investment income is less than $50, but you must still report the income. The slip is a reporting convenience for the institution, not the thing that creates your obligation. If you earned $30 of interest and no slip arrived, that $30 still goes on line 12100.
No, and this is the most common mix-up. Per the CRA T5 guide, box 10 is the actual amount of dividends other than eligible dividends, box 11 is the taxable amount of those, and box 12 is the dividend tax credit for them. Eligible dividends are the higher numbered set: box 24 actual, box 25 taxable, box 26 dividend tax credit.
For dividends paid in 2019 or later, the taxable gross-up is 15% of the actual amount for dividends other than eligible dividends, so box 11 is box 10 multiplied by 115%. For eligible dividends the taxable gross-up is 38% of the actual amount, so box 25 is box 24 multiplied by 138%. You pay tax on the grossed-up amount and then claim a dividend tax credit that partly offsets it.
Box 13, interest from Canadian sources, is reported at line 12100, interest and other investment income. Interest is taxed at your full marginal rate, the same as employment income, which makes it the least tax efficient form of investment income to hold in a non-registered account.
Investment income earned inside a TFSA or an RRSP is tax sheltered, so it is not taxable investment income that you report at line 12100 or line 12000. T5 reporting is about taxable, non-registered investment income. This is exactly why holding interest bearing savings inside a TFSA is more tax efficient for most people than holding it in a taxable account.
The CRA requires filers to file a T5 information return by the last day of February following the calendar year the return applies to. If the due date falls on a Saturday, Sunday or public holiday recognized by the CRA, it is on time if received or postmarked the next business day. In practice this is why T5 slips land in late winter for the previous tax year.
Yes. The CRA instructs you to report the interest on any income tax refund you received, as shown on your notice of assessment or reassessment. It is reported as interest and other investment income like any other interest.
It depends on what the bonus actually is. Interest paid on a promotional rate is interest and is reported like any other interest. A flat cash bonus for opening an account is a different and genuinely unsettled question in Canadian tax. We cover that in detail in our guide on whether bank and credit card bonuses are taxable in Canada.
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- Canadian bank account bonus tracker
- No credit check banking in Canada
Disclosure: Some links on this page are referral links, and Bremo may earn a commission if you open an account, at no cost to you. This does not change what we recommend. The box definitions, gross-up factors, dividend tax credit percentages, line mappings and filing deadline on this page were verified on 17 July 2026 against the CRA's T5 guide (T4015, Return of Investment Income) and the CRA pages for lines 12000 and 12010, line 12100, and line 40425. Tax rules change and individual situations vary. This page is educational general information, not tax advice. For your own return, consult the CRA or a qualified tax professional.