Spousal RRSP: Who Contributes and Who Reports the Income?
Say you put money into your spouse’s retirement account. With a spousal RRSP, the savings are theirs and the contribution counts toward your RRSP deduction limit.
Get help with the tax side of your RRSPThink of the receipt as having two names for a reason. One tells you who put the money in. The other tells you whose account it went into. That’s why the same deposit can matter to both of you, in different ways.
Spousal RRSP at a glance
Your deposit goes into your partner’s account
- You
Make the contribution
Your RRSP deduction limit applies.
- Your partner
Holds the spousal RRSP
Your partner is the annuitant, generally entitled to withdraw.
Your contribution uses your RRSP deduction limit. If your partner withdraws money later, the dates of your contributions can affect who reports the income.
What do the two names on the receipt mean?
In a regular RRSP of your own, you may put the money in and hold the account. With a spousal RRSP, those two roles belong to two people. You’re the contributor, and your partner is the account holder. The paperwork may call them the annuitant. That’s the person entitled to receive money from the plan.
The contribution receipt gives you a way to see both roles at once. It should show you as the contributor and your partner as the annuitant. Your partner generally makes withdrawals from the account.
Which RRSP limit does the contribution use?
Suppose you put money into your own RRSP and make a separate contribution to a spousal RRSP held by your partner. Both of those contributions draw on your RRSP deduction limit. The amount you can deduct across the two accounts is based on that one limit.
Think about whose money is going into the plan and whose name appears as the contributor on the receipt. If you’re going through your receipts at tax time, a spousal contribution you made is part of your own RRSP records, even though your partner holds the account.
Whose income is it when your partner withdraws?
When your partner withdraws money from a spousal RRSP, your contribution dates can matter. If you contributed to any of your partner’s RRSPs in the withdrawal year or either of the two previous calendar years, you may have to report some or all of what your partner withdrew.
Imagine you contributed in December and your partner withdrew some money the following January. The contribution falls in the previous calendar year. A withdrawal slip can still arrive in your partner’s name even if some of the income belongs on your return. The receipts and withdrawal dates help determine the reporting.
Which contribution years matter?
Look at the withdrawal year and the two calendar years before it
Two years before
Check for a contribution
The year before
Check this year too
Withdrawal year
Check for contributions in the same year
A contribution you made to any of your partner’s RRSPs in this window may affect who reports some or all of the withdrawal.
What we can review for your personal taxes
If the bank has issued contribution receipts, those are a useful starting point. A withdrawal slip and the dates of any contributions are useful when money came out of the plan, especially if both events were close together.
Anytime Accounting can review which RRSP deduction limit applies and, if there was a withdrawal, which return should include the income. If you’d like us to prepare the returns, we can first agree on the work and explain what records we’d need.
Questions about your spousal RRSP and taxes?
We can check how the contribution affects your return and, if money was withdrawn, which return should report it. Your first consultation is free.
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Official Canadian sources (3)
These CRA and Government of Canada pages are the primary sources used to check the tax information in this article.
This article is general information, not personal tax advice. Your situation may differ. For advice specific to you, book a free call.