What Is a Relevé 1 Slip and How Do You File It?

A Relevé 1 slip is the Quebec tax document your employer issues each year to report your employment income, taxable benefits, and the amounts withheld from your pay for provincial income tax, the Quebec Pension Plan, and the Quebec Parental Insurance Plan. Employees use it to complete their Quebec tax return; employers must prepare one for every person who received salary, wages, commissions, or other remuneration during the year. For the 2025 tax year, the slip is due by Monday, March 2, 2026, because the usual February 28 deadline falls on a Saturday.¹

What the RL-1 Reports and Who Gets One

The RL-1 captures employment income and everything attached to it: gross wages, bonuses, commissions, vacation pay, Quebec tax withheld at source, QPP and QPIP contributions, and taxable benefits such as employer contributions to a private health services plan.²

An employer must issue an RL-1 to anyone who received that kind of remuneration during the year, including current, former, and future employees, as well as self-employed individuals paid commissions. The obligation follows the work, not the business address: if an employee lives in Quebec or performed the work in Quebec, they get an RL-1 even when the employer is based elsewhere.

Reading the Key Boxes

The slip identifies the employer by their ten-digit Québec Enterprise Number (NEQ) and the employee by their nine-digit Social Insurance Number. The boxes that matter most on a typical slip:

Box A — gross employment income, including bonuses and vacation pay. This is the figure that flows to your tax return.
Box B.A — the employee’s base QPP contributions withheld during the year.
Box B.B — the employee’s second additional QPP contributions on earnings above the first ceiling.
Box E — total Quebec income tax withheld from pay.
Box H — QPIP premiums withheld from the employee.
Box J — the taxable value of employer contributions to a private health services plan.²
Box L — a catch-all for other taxable benefits not reported in boxes J, K, P, V, or W. Benefits received by a shareholder in that capacity go in Box O instead.

Every figure on the slip should match the cumulative totals in the payroll register. Small discrepancies between the slip and the underlying records are what trigger follow-up from Revenu Québec.

Using Your RL-1 on Your Quebec Tax Return

If you’re an employee, the RL-1 is the starting point for your Quebec income tax return (form TP-1). The amount in Box A goes on line 101 as your employment income.³ The Quebec tax withheld in Box E goes on line 451, where it counts as a credit against your tax owing.⁴

Other boxes feed into related calculations. Box B.A affects your QPP credit; Box H feeds the QPIP credit. If your total withholdings exceed what you actually owe, you get a refund. When you receive RL-1 slips from more than one employer in the same year, add the corresponding boxes together before entering the totals on your return.

Haven’t received your slip by the deadline? Contact your employer first. If that doesn’t produce it, contact Revenu Québec directly, since they may already have the data from the employer’s electronic submission and can help you complete your return.

Employer Filing Deadline

Employers must deliver RL-1 slips to recipients and file the RL-1 summary with Revenu Québec by the last day of February following the tax year. For the 2025 tax year, that lands on Saturday, February 28, 2026, so the deadline shifts to Monday, March 2, 2026.¹

You can deliver slips to recipients in person, by mail, or electronically. Delivery to your own employees by email requires their written consent, but a secure portal that meets Revenu Québec’s confidentiality requirements does not require consent. Delivery to non-employee beneficiaries always requires written consent regardless of method. Any employee who asks for a paper copy must receive one.²

How Employers Submit the Slips

If you file more than five RL-1 slips for a calendar year, you have to submit them online. That rule took effect January 1, 2024, and applies to RL slips of the same type.⁵ Paper filing is only available to employers filing five or fewer slips, and paper-filing when you’re above the threshold carries its own penalty.⁶

Most employers file through My Account for businesses on the Revenu Québec website, accessed via clicSÉQUR. The portal lets you enter and submit individual RL-1 slips and the RL-1 summary directly.⁷ Larger employers with payroll software certified by Revenu Québec transmit RL-1 data as XML files through the Transmitting RL Slips service. Keep the confirmation number you receive; that’s your proof of filing.

If you’re within the five-slip threshold and choose paper, mail only Copy 1 of each slip together with the RL-1 summary, using the processing centre address that matches your region.⁶

The RL-1 Summary

Along with the individual slips, every employer files an RL-1 summary (form RLZ-1.S-V) that reconciles all source deductions and employer contributions for the year. The summary ties your Quebec tax withholdings, QPP contributions, QPIP premiums, and health services fund contributions back to what you remitted through the year.⁸

The summary totals pull directly from the slips. Line 21 uses the total of Box B.A across every slip (employee QPP), line 28 uses the total of Box H (employee QPIP), and line 35 uses the total of Box E (Quebec tax withheld). Line 50.1 uses the total of Box A to calculate the health services fund contribution. Any gap between these totals and what you remitted during the year becomes a balance owing or a credit.

Fixing Mistakes After Filing

When you spot an error on a slip you’ve already filed, you correct it by filing an amended slip rather than starting over. The amended slip carries the letter “A” in the code field, the sequential number of the original, the word “Modifié” on both the recipient’s and Revenu Québec’s copies, and the corrected amounts. Copy the unchanged amounts into their boxes too, because the amended slip replaces the original in full.⁹

Sending amended slips through the XML service means putting them in a separate file that contains only amended slips. Each amended slip receives a new sequential number, and the original slip’s number goes in the reference field. Any time you amend an RL-1, you must also amend and refile the RL-1 summary on paper, along with a letter explaining the reason. Don’t file an amended slip only to correct a recipient’s address or identity; those are handled through a different process.

Penalties for Late or Incorrect Filing

Missing the deadline costs $25 per day, up to a maximum of $2,500, and this penalty is separate from any other late-filing charges on income tax or source deductions.¹⁰

Filing slips with missing or incorrect information triggers a further $100 penalty per slip. That penalty does not apply where the missing information is an employee’s personal details and you made a reasonable effort to obtain it.² Filing on paper when you were required to file electronically carries a separate penalty of its own. Reconciling payroll totals early, filing electronically, and keeping records current through the year is what keeps all three off the table.

1
Revenu Québec. Filing RL Slips and the RL-1 Summary – General Information
2
Revenu Québec. Guide to Filing the RL-1 Slip: Employment and Other Income
3
Revenu Québec. Line 101 – Employment Income
4
Revenu Québec. Line 451 – Québec Income Tax Withheld at Source
5
Revenu Québec. Reminder: Sending Documents and Paying Electronically – Businesses Have Obligations
6
Revenu Québec. Sending RL Slips and Summaries by Mail
7
Revenu Québec. Sending RL Slips and Summaries to Revenu Québec Online
8
Revenu Québec. Guide to Filing the RL-1 Summary: Summary of Source Deductions and Employer Contributions
9
Revenu Québec. Amending RL Slips
10
Revenu Québec. Penalty for Failure to File