T2200 Update - Expenses Relating to Working from Home

Many members of the UBC faculty and staff community have moved to working-from-home scenarios as a result of COVID-19, and the university’s finance teams have received some questions about whether UBC will be issuing T2200 tax forms for the 2020 tax year.

The T2200 tax form relates to Declaration of Conditions of Employment and enables employees to deduct home-based work expenses when filing their income tax returns.

In April we shared an announcement recapping that, while the university does not generally issue T2200 forms because requirements for employees are rarely met, UBC would track any changes to guidance from the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA).

We have been closely monitoring whether any changes to that guidance have been implemented, relating to the issuance of T2200 forms and/or the conditions enabling employees to deduct home-based work expenses on their income tax returns.  The university has also consulted with external accounting firms and legal counsel on this issue. 

While it is anticipated that the CRA will provide additional clarification in the near future, there has been no change to their guidance as yet.  As a result, consistent with current practice, UBC will not be issuing the T2200 forms at this point.  If guidance from Canada Revenue Agency changes, UBC will revisit this decision. 

The guidelines of the CRA continue to be as follows:

"To deduct home work space expenses for income tax purposes employees must be required by their contract of employment with UBC to work from home and directly pay for those expenses without reimbursement from UBC. Furthermore, one of the following conditions must also be met:

1. The work space must be where the employee principally (more than 50% of the time) performs their employment duties.
2. The work space must be used exclusively by the employee to earn employment income and be used on a regular and continuous basis for meeting customers or other persons in the ordinary course of performing the duties of employment."

More information on claiming employment expenses is available on the UBC Finance website. We will continue to monitor the situation for any change, and will provide an update if any further guidance is provided by the Canada Revenue Agency.