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← Curriculum /E-services and digital channels /Level 1

The digital channels and what each is for

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Almost every question in this line begins with an ambiguity the caller does not know they have created: they say "my CRA account". There are three, they show different things, and they are reached differently. My Account is where an individual sees their own tax and benefit information. My Business Account is where a business owner sees the business's program accounts. Represent a Client is where someone authorised to act for another party sees that party's information. A caller who cannot find something is very often in the right portal for the wrong subject, or the wrong portal for the right one. Establishing which door they are behind resolves a surprising share of calls before any tax question is reached, and it is the reason this tutorial comes first in the line.

How to work through this tutorial

This maps the digital estate before going into any part of it: 1. Learn the three portals and whose information each one carries. 2. Understand the difference between a sign-in credential and what it unlocks. 3. Learn how a business number and its program accounts organise the business side. 4. Understand what the portals deliberately do not do. 5. Work through an example where the caller is in the wrong place. 6. Check your work against the common errors. 7. Verify every specific against CRA's published guidance before relying on it.

Three portals, three subjects

The portals are separated by whose information is being viewed, not by what the person is doing. **My Account** is for an individual looking at their own tax and benefit information — their returns, their notices, their benefit payments, their contribution room. **My Business Account** is for an owner, partner, director or officer looking at a business's accounts — payroll, GST/HST, corporate income tax and the rest. It is reached with the person's own credential, but what it shows belongs to the business. **Represent a Client** is for someone acting for another party: an accountant, a bookkeeper, an employee of a firm, a family member. It shows another taxpayer's information, and only to the extent that taxpayer has authorised. The distinction matters most in the middle case. A sole proprietor genuinely has information in two places: their personal return is in My Account, their GST/HST account is in My Business Account. Telling them "it's in your CRA account" is not an answer, because they have two.

A credential is not an entitlement

Signing in and being entitled to see something are separate steps, and they fail separately. The credential proves the person is who they say they are. CRA accepts more than one kind — a CRA-issued user ID and password, a Sign-In Partner arrangement that uses the person's own bank credentials, and provincial digital identity services where they are available. Which one the person used is usually irrelevant to the question they are asking, but it matters completely when they cannot get in, because the recovery path is different for each. What that credential unlocks is a separate question, decided by what CRA holds against that person: their own accounts, any business accounts they have been given access to, and any clients they are authorised to represent. A representative who has signed in successfully but cannot see a client has an authorisation problem, not a sign-in problem. Keeping those two apart saves a long conversation about passwords that were never the issue.

How the business side is organised

The business side has a structure the individual side does not, and it is worth learning early because it explains most "I can't see my account" calls from businesses. A business has one **business number** identifying the business itself. Attached to it are **program accounts**, one for each thing the business is registered for — payroll, GST/HST, corporate income tax, import-export and others. Each program account has its own identifier built from the business number, a two-letter code for the program, and a four-digit reference number distinguishing multiple accounts of the same type. So a business that has registered for payroll and for GST/HST has one business number and two program accounts. A caller who says "my business number doesn't work" is often quoting the business number alone where a full program account number is wanted, or quoting one program's account where another is meant. Access to My Business Account is held by a *person*, not by the business. That has a consequence people find surprising and which comes up in this line repeatedly: when the person who set it up leaves, the business does not automatically retain access.

What the portals do not do

Two expectations cause most of the disappointment. The first is immediacy. A portal shows what CRA's systems hold, and things arrive in those systems on their own schedule. A return that has been transmitted is not the same as a return that has been assessed. A slip an employer has not yet filed will not appear no matter how many times the taxpayer refreshes. An agent who explains that the portal reflects processing rather than driving it prevents the follow-up call. The second is completeness. The portals are self-service for common transactions, not a full substitute for every interaction. Some things still require a form, a signature or a conversation. Knowing roughly where that boundary sits is what lets an agent say "you can do that yourself, here" with confidence — which is worth far more to the caller than being walked through it on the phone.

A worked example: the right question, the wrong door

Teaching example. The figures below are invented to show the method. They are not CRA figures, and no amount here should be used for a real taxpayer.

The figures and details in this example are invented for teaching. Nothing here should be quoted as CRA's position. Daniel runs a small landscaping business as a sole proprietor. He calls because he wants to check what he owes on his GST/HST account, and says he has looked "all over my CRA account" and cannot find it. The first useful question is not about GST/HST. It is: which portal are you signed in to? Daniel is in My Account, because that is where he filed his personal return. His personal information is all there — his notice of assessment, his benefit payments — and no GST/HST account, because that account does not belong to Daniel the individual. It belongs to Daniel's business. He has a business number, and a GST/HST program account attached to it. That account is visible in My Business Account, which he has never registered for. Suppose his balance turns out to be $1,240. The point of the example is not the number. It is that Daniel's question was answerable all along and he was looking in a place where the answer structurally could not be. Ten seconds establishing the portal would have saved the search. Carry the habit into every call in this line: before answering "where do I find it", establish where they are.

Common errors

Saying "your CRA account" as though there were one. Name the portal. Assuming a sole proprietor's business information sits with their personal information. It does not. Treating a representative's "I can't see the client" as a sign-in problem. Sign-in and authorisation fail separately and are fixed differently. Quoting the structure of a program account number from memory. Confirm the format and the program codes. Forgetting that My Business Account access belongs to a person, not to the business. Telling a caller a slip is missing when the employer simply has not filed it yet. The portal shows what has arrived. Conflating transmitted with assessed. A confirmation that a return was received is not an assessment. Walking a caller through something on the phone when telling them where to self-serve would leave them able to do it again next time.

What to verify this tutorial against

This was drafted without a source document. Portal names, the services each offers, and the structure of account numbers change, so confirm all of it. CRA's overview pages for My Account, My Business Account and Represent a Client set out what each portal is for and who may use it. These are the primary references for this tutorial. CRA's guidance on the business number explains the number itself, the program account structure, the two-letter program identifiers, and the four-digit reference number. Confirm the format and the current list of programs. CRA's sign-in pages list the accepted credential types, including the Sign-In Partner arrangement and any provincial digital identity services currently accepted. CRA's pages on authorising a representative cover the relationship between a credential and what it unlocks, which is the distinction this tutorial leans on. Processing-time guidance published by CRA is the reference for what "received" versus "assessed" means and how long each stage takes. Do not quote timelines from memory; they are published and they change.

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