Emergency salary advance

This section describes the roles and responsibilities of parties involved with requesting and processing an emergency salary advance.

On this page

• Process description
• Employee responsibilities
• Manager responsibilities
• Finance responsibilities
• Trusted source responsibilities
• Pay Centre responsibilities

Process description

The Pay Centre may issue an emergency salary advance to employees who meet certain eligibility criteria.

Eligibility criteria

An emergency salary advance may only be issued to employees:

• on initial appointment, re-appointment or following a return from a leave without pay
• if a regular pay was not received

Maximum amount of request

The amount of the emergency salary advance request is not to exceed two thirds of the employee’s gross pay entitlement.

The Pay Centre will only process emergency salary advance requests that are supported by one of the following:

• a letter of offer (since it is done on the initial appointment or re-appointment)
• manager confirmation following a period of leave without pay

Treatment of emergency salary advances and priority payments

The Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat states that the emergency salary advances and priority payments are not considered advances as per the Accountable Advance Regulations but rather payments for services rendered for which employees have not yet been compensated.

To ensure we manage recoveries consistently, we must recover these payments like we would overpayments.

References

Additional flexibilities with regards to the recovery of overpayments, emergency salary advances, and priority payments

Directive on Terms and Conditions of Employment (Directive)

Employee responsibilities

Employees should speak with their manager if they wish to request an emergency salary advance.

Manager responsibilities

Managers are responsible for:

• determining if an emergency salary advance meets the threshold set out by the Directive on Terms and Conditions of Employment
• obtaining approval for the emergency salary advance request following departmental procedures
• requesting the emergency salary advance in writing, following these steps:
  • step 1: complete a pay action request form
  • step 2: complete and sign the request for an emergency salary advance
  • step 3: request that the trusted source:
    • authenticate the signature
    • submit the request to the Pay Centre by encrypted email, fax or mail to the Pay Center Mail Facility

Finance responsibilities

Upon receiving the requisition for payment form (accessible only on the Government of Canada network) from the Pay Centre, finance personnel are responsible for:

• obtaining section 34 authorization for the emergency salary advance (following departmental processes for sign-off)
• issuing the emergency salary advance payment
• sending the signed requisition for payment form by encrypted email, fax or mail to the Pay Centre Mail Facility

Trusted source responsibilities

Upon receiving an emergency salary advance request from the manager, the trusted source is responsible for:

• ensuring that signatures on paper requests to the Pay Centre are authenticated before sending it to the Pay Centre, including:
  • the section 34 signature for all requests affecting financial results or the manager’s budget
  • the human resources delegated signature for all requests being submitted by departments (excluding any employees send directly)

Pay Centre responsibilities

Pay Centre is responsible for:

• contacting the employee to advise them when the first regular pay cheque will be available if it is expected beyond the service standards identified in the Treasury Board policy or relevant terms and conditions of employment
• checking the trusted source list for any emergency salary advance requests
• calculating the emergency salary advance based on the manager’s request and the particulars of the hire or return from leave
• providing:
  • this information to finance via a requisition for payment form  (accessible only on the Government of Canada network)
  • supporting documentation to finance, including the case number

The receipt of the signed requisition for payment from finance will be the authority for the Pay Centre to establish the recovery process as the established process.