CA Tax Tools

RDSP Carry-Forward Catch-Up Planner

Turn the matching-rate buckets on your Statement of Entitlement into a contribution plan.

01STATEMENT INPUTS

Unused entitlements

Enter grant dollars from the matching-rate buckets on your issuer/ESDC Statement of Entitlement.

No contribution is required to receive a bond.

02CATCH-UP RESULT

Estimated catch-up grant

$7,500

$3,500 of contribution matched

Estimated catch-up bond

$5,000

Subject to ESDC entitlement verification

Contribution not matched

$0

Grant allocation

300% bucket$3,000
200% bucket$4,000
100% bucket$500
ESDC applies the oldest available entitlements and highest matching rates first. The exact deposit depends on the official Statement of Entitlement and is capped at $10,500 of grant and $11,000 of bond in a year.
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Where the three matching buckets come from

The Canada Disability Savings Grant is paid at three different rates, and which rate applies in a given year depends on the beneficiary's adjusted family net income for that year. Where income is at or below the second threshold — $117,045 for transactions dated in 2026 — the grant is 300% on the first $500 of contributions and 200% on the next $1,000. Above that threshold it is 100% on the first $1,000. That is where the 300%, 200% and 100% entitlements on a Statement of Entitlement come from: one line for each past year, at the rate that year's income earned.

Because the thresholds are indexed every year, an entitlement from an earlier year was set against that year's numbers, not today's — Employment and Social Development Canada publishes the matching thresholds for the current year and the previous ten in its annual income-matching notice. Beneficiaries under 18 are assessed on the income used to determine the Canada child benefit; from the year they turn 17, they need to file their own returns so the right income test is applied from age 19 onward.

What a catch-up year can and cannot do

Two ceilings bound every plan. In a single year, carry-forward payments cannot exceed $10,500 of grant and $11,000 of bond. Over a lifetime, the plan cannot receive more than $70,000 of grant or $20,000 of bond, and total private contributions to all of a beneficiary's RDSPs are capped at $200,000. A large one-off contribution therefore cannot buy back a decade of grant in one go — it takes several catch-up years, which is the practical reason to start well before the last eligible year.

That last year matters more than any other date here. Grant is paid on contributions made up to December 31 of the year the beneficiary turns 49, and the bond can be paid until the same year. Unused entitlement is not carried past it, so entitlement still sitting in the 300% bucket at the end of that year is simply lost. Working backwards from that deadline — how many years remain, and how much of the $10,500 annual cap each of them can absorb — is usually the whole planning exercise.

Before you send the money

Confirm the buckets against the Statement of Entitlement rather than estimating them: Employment and Social Development Canada administers the grant and bond and holds the official figures, and this planner assumes the amounts you enter are the ones it will honour. Confirm too that the beneficiary's returns are filed — a missing return for either of the past two years can stall a bond payment even when the entitlement exists — and remember that the beneficiary can only have one RDSP at a time, though it may have more than one holder.

Finally, plan the withdrawal side before you contribute heavily. Grant and bond paid into the plan sit behind an assistance holdback amount for the following ten years, and an early withdrawal repays three dollars of that assistance for every dollar taken out. Catch-up contributions and early withdrawals work against each other, so the sequence matters as much as the amounts.

Official sources

Frequently asked questions

How many years of unused RDSP entitlement can I carry forward?

You can carry forward up to 10 years of unused grant and bond entitlement, provided the beneficiary met the eligibility requirements in those years.

What is the annual RDSP catch-up limit?

Carry-forward payments are capped at $10,500 of grant and $11,000 of bond in one year.

How far back does the carry-forward window actually reach?

10 years, but never earlier than 2008, when RDSPs became available. The Canada Revenue Agency gives the example of a plan opened in 2025 carrying entitlements from 2015 to 2025, and a plan opened in 2029 carrying 2019 to 2029. The window also closes: entitlements can only be carried forward before the end of the year the beneficiary turns 49.

Do I have to have had an RDSP in those earlier years?

No. Entitlement accumulates on eligibility, not on having a plan. What matters is that the beneficiary met the requirements in each year being claimed — approved for the disability tax credit and resident in Canada. The Canada Revenue Agency example of Roger, who opened his first plan in 2025, has ten years of accumulated grant and bond entitlement waiting on the day the account is opened.

Which entitlement is used up first when I contribute?

The highest matching rate available is applied first. In the Canada Revenue Agency's carry-forward example an $800 contribution attracts $2,400 of grant, all of it matched at the 300% rate, leaving the remaining 300%-rate entitlement and the whole 200%-rate entitlement for later years. That is why a modest contribution can be worth far more in a catch-up year than in an ordinary one.

Does the bond need a contribution to be paid?

No. The bond is paid into the plan by the Government of Canada without any contribution, up to $1,000 a year and $20,000 over a lifetime, and unused bond entitlement can be caught up at $11,000 a year. To qualify for the bond or earn a grant, the beneficiary must have filed income tax and benefit returns for the past two years and must keep filing for every future year they have an RDSP.

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