You probably have a extreme listening to impairment, you might be entitled to assert the
(DTC). The DTC is a non-refundable tax credit score that’s meant to acknowledge the impression of assorted non-itemizable disability-related prices. For 2025, the worth of the federal credit score was $1,470 however add the provincial tax financial savings and the mixed annual worth may be greater than $3,200, relying in your province of residence. The DTC can also be a requirement to qualify for opening a registered incapacity financial savings plan (RDSP).
Not each incapacity qualifies, and there are particular standards relying on the kind of incapacity. In a case determined in late 2025, a taxpayer who was exhausting of listening to tried to assert the DTC for the 2023 taxation yr. The taxpayer is a resident of Newfoundland and Labrador who works as a meals service supervisor in a faculty cafeteria kitchen.
For the 2023 tax yr, the taxpayer ready the
’s (CRA’s) required
, Incapacity Tax Credit score Certificates. The related parts of the shape had been accomplished by the taxpayer’s audiologist, who made numerous observations together with that the taxpayer has “delicate to moderately-severe sensorineural congenital listening to loss in each ears.” She wrote that the taxpayer makes use of bilateral behind-the-ear listening to aids, and that with out these listening to aids she’s going to miss about 86 per cent of the common speech spectrum, versus solely lacking 27 per cent with optimized listening to aids. The audiologist additionally famous that listening to speech in a loud setting might be troublesome.
The Type T2201 additionally asks in regards to the taxpayer’s capacity, whereas utilizing listening to aids, “to listen to in order to grasp a well-recognized individual in a quiet setting.” To this, the audiologist wrote that the taxpayer “has problem, however doesn’t take an inordinate period of time to listen to in order to grasp a well-recognized individual in a quiet setting.”
The CRA subsequently reviewed the taxpayer’s submitted type and issued a discover of willpower informing the taxpayer that she was not eligible for the DTC. The taxpayer objected and in the end appealed the CRA’s determination to the Tax Courtroom.
At trial the taxpayer testified that she needed to forego sure actions on account of her listening to loss. For instance, she missed out on playground video games when she was a toddler. She mentioned that it was additionally unattainable for her to go swimming together with her listening to aids because the batteries might be broken if uncovered to moisture. She famous that within the health club, sweating would have the identical impact.
Often at work, the taxpayer misses out on conversations if the extent of background noise is simply too excessive and generally she must ask others to repeat what they’ve simply mentioned. Additionally, collaborating in conversations over the cellphone might be a problem for her. For instance, generally throughout a cellphone dialog, she could must ask the opposite individual to ship an e mail to make sure that she has absorbed the knowledge precisely and fully.
The taxpayer may also learn lips and she or he makes use of that talent to complement her listening to aids, however that is solely helpful when the opposite individual is inside her line of sight.
The choose reviewed the regulation governing the DTC, which states that to be able to qualify, a person will need to have “a number of extreme and extended impairments in bodily … features … the consequences of that are such that the person’s capacity to carry out a single primary exercise of each day residing is markedly restricted.”
The
goes on to make clear that “a person’s capacity to carry out a primary exercise of each day residing is markedly restricted solely the place all or considerably the entire time, even with … the usage of applicable units … the person is … unable (or requires an inordinate period of time) … to listen to) in order to grasp, in a quiet setting, one other individual conversant in the person.”
In different phrases, a taxpayer could be eligible for the DTC provided that, whereas utilizing her listening to aids, she was nonetheless markedly restricted in her capacity to listen to and perceive a well-recognized individual in a quiet setting.
Whereas the CRA acknowledged that the taxpayer does have a “extreme and extended impairment” in certainly one of her bodily features, the query was whether or not she was “markedly restricted” within the methods the regulation requires.
In courtroom, the taxpayer’s mom, who was representing her, advocated for modifications to the Tax Act, saying that almost all people who find themselves exhausting of listening to don’t spend most of their time in quiet settings. In her view, the check for these exhausting of listening to needs to be amended. The choose consequently defined to her that he has “no capacity to amend the Act,” which is one thing that Parliament should do.
Whereas the choose was sympathetic to the challenges confronted by the taxpayer whereas at work or in social or leisure settings, he nonetheless concluded that the taxpayer was merely not eligible for the DTC, for the reason that taxpayer, “whereas utilizing her listening to aids was not markedly restricted in her capacity to listen to in order to grasp, in a quiet setting, one other one who was conversant in her.”
In consequence, her declare for the DTC was denied.
Jamie Golombek,
FCPA, FCA, CFP, CLU, TEP, is the managing director, Tax & Property Planning with CIBC Personal Wealth in Toronto.
Jamie.Golombek@cibc.com
.
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