May 9, 2026
The COVID-19 pandemic was a brutal time for business owners. Jarmila Rejvold, a restaurant owner from Niagara Falls, was one of many business owners that faced hardship during this time and leaned on government benefits to stay afloat. Now she's being asked to repay thousands in COVID-19 benefits.
During the pandemic, Rejvold was forced to close her restaurant for two years and developed an illness during the same period, she told CTV News (1). Because of the closure, Rejvold applied for the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) and the Canadian Recovery Benefit (CRB) — temporary financial assistance programs offered by the federal government during the pandemic.
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Rejvold said she received over $24,600 in CRB payments during that time, saying the "government's offer to give us benefits was very welcome." However, Rejvold is now being told she was not eligible for the benefits in the first place and must pay them back.
Rejvold complied and repaid the $24,600. She was then advised she was also not eligible for the CERB program either and is now being asked to repay $14,000, CTV News reported.
Rejvold received a letter from the CRA outlining their reasoning: "We have determined you are not eligible for the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit (CERB). You did not earn at least $5,000 (before taxes) of employment or self-employment income in 2019 or in the 12 months before your application," the letter states.
While Rejvold appealed the decision in federal court, her efforts were effectively moot — she is still required to come up with the additional $14,000.
"I'm very disappointed and it's stressful," Rejvold told the outlet.
How CERB benefits worked and who was eligible
On March 25, 2020, the Canada Emergency Response Benefit Act was passed in order to provide income for eligible Canadian workers whose employment income was "disrupted by COVID-19 (2)." This act established CERB, which provided a taxable benefit of $2,000 every four weeks for up to 16 weeks to eligible Canadian workers.
CERB payments were available from March 15, 2020 to September 26, 2020, according to the CRA — Canadians could apply as late as December 2, 2020 (3).
Eligibility for CERB was based on two main requirements: the applicant having earned $5,000 or more before taxes in 2019 — or in the 12 months prior to applying — and having had their working hours severely reduced or cut entirely due to the pandemic. Additionally, applicants could not have earned more than $1,000 in income during each monthly claim period and had to be at least 15 years old (4).
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CRA continuing efforts to collect COVID-19 benefit payments
According to the Canadian Press (CP), the CRA began contacting individuals for repayment in 2023 (5). A spokesperson for the agency, Nina Ioussoupova, notes that as of November 2025, the CRA was owed over $10 billion in COVID-19 benefits and had "disbursed $83.5 billion in COVID benefits to Canadians, including $45.3 billion for the Canada Emergency Response Benefit."
Ioussoupova revealed that the massive debt resulted from overpayments, as well as from individuals who received financial assistance they were not actually eligible for.
"Emergency benefits needed to be delivered extremely quickly to millions of Canadians, leading to an attestation-based application process beginning with the Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB)," she said, adding, "Individuals were required to confirm they met the program eligibility criteria and were made aware that the CRA might verify this information at a later date."
As of November 30, 2025, Ioussoupova confirmed that around 1.4 million Canadians had repaid approximately $3.3 billion in debts related to pandemic benefits.
Why is there such a large amount of pandemic benefits to be repaid?
A Government of Canada briefing binder prepared for a parliamentary committee appearance in February 2023 (6) stated multiple reasons for COVID-19 repayments. One key issue was how eligibility was determined. The federal government relied on personal attestations from applicants to determine initial eligibility, using post-payment measures to verify suitability after the fact. This was done to provide fast emergency benefits to Canadians, but it came with a cost: it opened the door for many ineligible Canadians to receive overpayments — whether through application errors or fraudulent applications.
In fact, a report from the Auditor General of Canada from 2022 notes that this approach — combined with a lack of data at the time — resulted in "a significant amount of payments made to recipients who were ineligible or whose eligibility needs to be verified (7).”
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"We found $4.6 billion of overpayments made to ineligible recipients of benefits for individuals. In addition, we estimated that at least $27.4 billion of payments to individuals and employers should be investigated further. The department and agency did not develop rigorous and comprehensive plans to verify the eligibility of recipients."
Additionally, the briefing explicitly noted that while CERB was "communicated to Canadians as one single benefit," it was made up of two income streams: CERB from the CRA and the Employment Insurance - Emergency Response Benefit (EI-ERB), administered by Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC). Canadians could have applied for CERB through the CRA or through Service Canada using Employment Insurance (8).
As the CRA notes on its website, Canadians who applied for CERB and received income from the CRA and EI or Service Canada may be required to pay back benefits received. It is possible that the multiple ways of applying for CERB (through CRA or EI) could have created confusion for applicants during a very stressful period, resulting in applicants mistakenly applying for both programs and being overpaid.
What options do Canadians who are being asked to repay benefits have
Canadians are facing hard times, with new data from Statistics Canada showing that 11% (4.5 million Canadians) of the population is under the poverty line. Having to pay back thousands in benefits while struggling with the cost of living can be financially debilitating. Some Canadians who are dealing with CERB repayment issues have mentioned losing access to tax return repayments and tax benefits as a result (9). What can Canadians who are receiving repayment letters from the CRA do?
The first step is to work with the agency to provide documentation showing that they were eligible to receive the benefits. If the CRA determines they were ineligible based on the information presented, applicants can request a second review within 30 days of the initial decision. If the CRA denies an appeal again, the next step is to apply for a judicial review from the Federal Court within 30 days of receiving the second review decision (10).
Taking on the CRA in Federal Court is no small matter, so it may be best to get legal advice or representation before proceeding. Some firms have made efforts to assist Canadians on a pro bono basis when dealing with CRA repayment demands (11).
In the event you are required to make repayments after exhausting all available options, the CRA has indicated it has made instalments available and will not charge interest on these debts (12).
Article Sources
We rely only on vetted sources and credible third-party reporting. For details, see our ethics and guidelines.
CTV News (1, 9); Government of Canada (2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 12); The Canadian Press (5); Dentons (10); Osler (11)
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Brett Surbey is a corporate paralegal with KMSC Law LLP and freelance writer who has written for Yahoo Finance Canada, Success Magazine, Publishers Weekly, U.S. News & World Report, Forbes Advisor and multiple academic journals. He and his family live in northern Alberta, Canada.
