Canadians who work from home can claim home office expenses on their tax return, but if the process feels complicated, there’s a handy calculator that can help.
The online tool makes calculating how much you spent on your home office expenses easier.
To know if you’re eligible to claim this credit, you must meet several criteria, which you can find here.
Using the calculator
If you check off all the criteria boxes, you can use the calculator tool to answer a few questions.
Different prompts may show up depending on the year you claim expenses.
If you’re claiming for 2020 to 2022, the tool will ask a few more questions about working at home during the COVID-19 pandemic. If you’re filing for these years, you’ll be claiming the temporary flat rate of $2 for each day you worked from home during that time due to the pandemic.
For this example, we’ll walk you through how to calculate your expenses for 2023.
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Before you continue, you will need a bit more information like the total size of your workspace, the full size of all finished areas in your home, supporting documents for all the expenses you can claim for the duration you worked from home, and a T2200 form signed and completed by your employer. If you’re claiming for 2020 to 2022, you need a T2200S form signed by your employer.
You’ll then be asked if you rent or own your home or if you changed your residence or workspace within the year.
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Next, you’ll need to provide measurements of the designated workspace in your home and the total finished area of your home.
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Then, you’ll be asked to provide the period you worked at home within the year and the total amount you paid for an expense for the period you worked from home.
You will also need to know the total electricity, heat, water, and internet access fees you paid when you worked from home.
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Lastly, you’ll need to enter the total maintenance costs paid for the home and workspace and just the workspace itself.
From there, you’ll be able to calculate your total expenses.
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How to claim
Now that you’ve calculated your home office expenses, you must complete the applicable tax form.
Complete form T777 if you are:
- Only claiming home office expenses
- Claiming other employment expenses on line 22900, for example, motor vehicle expenses, office supplies, or certain phone expenses
- Filing a 2023 tax year return or 2019 or prior year tax return
Complete form T777S (for 2020, 2021, and 2022) if you are:
- Claiming the actual amount paid as working from home and are not claiming any other employment expenses on line 22900
- Filing a 2020, 2021, or 2022 tax return.
You can find full details about filling out the correct forms here.
If you’re looking for more tax tips, check out our list of credits and deductions you can claim this year and our handy guide to commonly asked tax questions.
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