How to process a PIER review
Let’s look at an example of a PIER report and how we go about reconciling the information based on what is within the Rise system.
1. Open your Pensionable and Insurable Earnings Review (PIER) documentation that you have received from the CRA.
2. Search for the employee that appears on the PIER documentation within Payroll.
3. In the employee’s profile, navigate to the Reports tab and select the Employee Payroll History Report.
4. Change the date range to reflect the pay year in question and click View Payroll History Report.
5. Once the report has run, down at the bottom of the report, click Export to Excel.
6. Format the Excel spreadsheet and only keep the following columns:
Employee
Pay Date
Pay Number
EI Earnings
Employment Insurance Contributions
Employer Employment Insurance Contribution
Pensionable Earnings
Canada Pension Plan Contribution
7. Insert and add additional columns to cover the following:
Calculated EI – add next to Employment Insurance Contribution column
Difference – add next to Calculated EI column
Pensionable Earnings w/ Exemption – add next to Canada Pension Plan Contribution column
Calculated CPP – add next to Pensionable Earnings w/ Exemption column
Difference – add next to Calculated CPP column
8. In the “Calculated EI” column, use the following formula to calculate the EI amount (EI Earnings x rate), in this example, the calculation will be based off column D (EI Earnings) x rate (1.66%, in excel it will be entered as 0.0166).
9. In Column G, the “Difference” column, you’ll want to subtract Column E (Employment Insurance Contribution) from Column F (Calculated EI) (=E2-F2).
10. Under the “Pensionable Earnings w/ exemption” column, you’ll need to subtract the per pay period exemption amount (this amount is based on your organization's pay period frequency) from the pensionable earnings. In this example, the organization has a bi-weekly pay period, making the exemption amount $134.62 per pay period. (For this example, the pensionable earnings for this period was $1576.92, minus $134.62 will give you the total $1442.30, this will be the amount that the CPP deduction is calculated off.)
11. Use the column K (Pensionable Earnings with Exemption) to calculate column L CPP deduction under the (Calculated CPP). In this example, the rate was K4 * 4.95% and for the purposes of the excel formula, will be displayed as 0.0495.
12. In Column M (Difference column), you’ll want to subtract Column J (Canada Pension Plan Contribution) from Column L (Calculated CPP) (=J4-L4).
13. Once this has been done for each pay period, the totals can be calculated, and any difference will appear under column G (Difference column) for CPP or EI.
In the instance that you find a discrepancy, you will need to contact the CRA to explain the deficiencies or pay any overdue amounts as well as any penalties and interest that apply.
This may have been caused by the reasons listed below:
- Payroll instructions with the wrong statutory deduction setup i.e. no CPP or EI boxes checked
- You may have overridden the statutory deductions within the input sheet may have been overridden
The CRA will be responsible in modifying the T4 slips and will send the employee copies to them directly. For additional information visit the CRA website.
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