Development of E-Business Tax Credit (CDAE)

• The completed Demande d'attestation - Société et Employés in Excel format.
• The mandatory supporting documents listed in the Demande d'attestation - Société et Employés form.
• The duly signed PDF pages from the Demande - Société and Demande - Employés tabs.
• For the tax credit claim to Revenu Québec, form CO-1029.8.36.DA, the corporation attestation and the employee attestations must be attached to the corporation’s tax return.

Who is eligible?

• Corporations that, in the taxation year, have an establishment in Québec where they carry on business in the IT sector.
• Corporations whose activities are mainly in computer systems design and related services, software publishing, or video game publishing and development.
• Corporations carrying on staffing activities may qualify where those activities meet the stated program conditions.
• Start-up corporations in Québec may qualify for the portion of the taxation year covered by the special start-up rule.

Who is not eligible

• Tax-exempt corporations.
• Crown corporations and wholly owned subsidiaries of Crown corporations.
• Corporations that obtained a certificate from the ministre des Finances for the deduction relating to a grand projet d’investissement, for any taxation year that falls wholly or partly within the exemption period for that project.

Eligible expenses

• Eligible salary paid to eligible employees.

Ineligible Costs and Activities

• Activities not primarily related to e-business, including work whose results are integrated into a product intended for sale or used to operate such a product.
• Operation or management of e-business solutions, computer systems or infrastructures, including transaction processing sites, remote operations centres, network or system management, and back-office operations.
• Call centre activities and first-level technical or administrative support.
• Hardware installation, employee training, administrative tasks, marketing-related information system activities, and activities linked to digital platforms hosting or exchanging violent, sexist, racist, discriminatory or explicit sexual content, unless the stated safeguards are demonstrated.
• The salary of a designated shareholder and any portion of an employee’s salary attributable to work whose ultimate beneficiary is a Québec government ministry or an entity covered by the Loi sur l’administration financière.

• After the end of the corporation’s fiscal year, send an email to mesuresfiscales@invest-quebec.com and put the legal name of the corporation and its Québec enterprise number (NEQ) in the subject line.
• Use the SharePoint link sent by Investissement Québec in response to that email.
• Upload the completed Demande d'attestation de société et d’employés in Excel format.
• Upload the mandatory supporting documents listed in the application, including the duly signed pages of the Demande - Société and Demande - Employés tabs in PDF format.

• Investissement Québec confirms eligibility after analyzing the file.
• Only complete applications are processed.
• A company that disagrees with an Investissement Québec decision may file a review request within 60 days of notification.
• Investissement Québec may modify or revoke an attestation or certificate; the company then has 30 days from the notice date to present its arguments and relevant documents.
• If a company received a credit it should not have received in whole or in part, Revenu Québec will recover the overpaid amount through a special tax.

• Investissement Québec validates the sector-specific eligibility conditions and issues the attestations, while Revenu Québec administers the tax rules and the credit claim.
• Fees are charged for eligibility applications and review requests; if an attestation or certificate request is refused, no fee is charged.
• During the eligibility period, Investissement Québec may visit the company’s facilities, and the company must provide access and requested information.
• Providing false or inaccurate information, or obstructing an Investissement Québec representative, is an offence punishable by a fine of $2,000 to $25,000.