The 2021 Child Care Benefit Application is now available online through Employee Self-Service (ESS) for eligible faculty, librarians, and staff.

The Child Care Benefit Plan reimburses eligible child care expenses incurred between January 1 – December 31 of each year for each eligible child (natural, step, common-law, adopted or ward) under age seven. For example, if your child has a birthdate of July 18, 2014, you are eligible for the months January – July 2021 inclusive, since your child turned seven in July 2021. For further details on the Child Care Benefit Plan, please see the Child Care Benefit article on the HR Service Centre.

Note reimbursement for the child care benefit will be made only for child care expenses (as defined in the Income Tax Act) incurred by the Member.  If, for example, an employee initially paid licensed child care centre fees for the months of January to June (six months) and was subsequently refunded the fees paid for January to March (three months) due to a closure of the licensed child care centre, the employee only incurred expenses for the period April to June. In this example, the employee would enter fees incurred for the months April to June as eligible for reimbursement.

Application Deadline

The deadline to submit an application is Thursday March 17, 2022.  No applications will be received after this date.

For detailed application instructions, including what information you need to gather before you start the process, please see the Child Care Benefit: Online Application Instructions article on the HR Service Centre.

Questions?

Please read the Child Care Benefit FAQs article on the HR Service Centre for answers to a number of questions, including the most frequently asked question:

Q: How do I calculate the daily rate if I pay a flat monthly fee?

A: Calculate the average daily rate based on the number of weekdays in the month per the following chart for 2021:

JAN	FEB	MAR	APR	MAY	JUN	JUL	AUG	SEP	OCT	NOV	DEC
21	20	23	22	21	22	22	22	22	21	22	23

For example, if you paid a flat monthly fee of $1,400 in January 2021, you would input a daily rate of $60.87 since 1,400 / 23 = 60.87 (even if your child was absent for some of those days).

Should you require accommodation through an alternate application format, please submit your request through the HR Service Centre Get Help inquiry as follows:

1. Select “Benefits” from the functional area drop down list
2. Click “Next”
3. Expand the window and in the field “What is your question?”, type “Please send me a Child Care Benefit Application Form”