I had worked one job all year. My T4 and RL-1 appeared to disagree about how much it had paid me.
The difference was large enough to notice and small enough to make me suspicious of my own typing. I checked the employer and year, then checked them again. Both were right. My sandwich was becoming an evening meal.
Different totals do not automatically mean a bad slip. Federal and Quebec rules can treat an employee benefit differently. The useful question is what explains the difference, not which number looks more familiar.
Start with the boxes, not the largest number
On an ordinary T4, box 14 reports employment income. On the Quebec RL-1, box A reports employment income, with other boxes identifying particular amounts and benefits. These are not two separate salaries to add together because two pieces of paper arrived.
Revenu Québec's employment-income instructions explain the amounts used on the Quebec return. Follow the software's paired-slip entry process, and review the resulting federal and Quebec totals. Do not overwrite a box simply to make the screens look alike.
For a useful comparison, put the two slips beside the final pay statement for the same year and any year-end benefits summary. Compare gross pay and taxable benefits separately from income tax, pension contributions and insurance premiums withheld. A net deposit cannot explain the gross income by itself.
The health-plan difference in my example
An employer's contribution to a qualifying private health services plan generally does not create a federal taxable benefit for the employee. That treatment is different from simply reimbursing an expense outside such a plan. CRA's taxable-benefits guide.
In Quebec, an employer's contribution to a private health services plan can be a taxable benefit reported in RL-1 box J and included in box A. The RL-1 guide explains the box treatment.
Take a deliberately simple example: $60,000 of salary, no other benefits, and a $1,200 employer health-plan benefit that is taxable in Quebec but not federally. T4 box 14 could show $60,000, while RL-1 box A shows $61,200 and box J shows $1,200. The $1,200 is already inside box A. Adding it again would turn the Quebec total into $62,400 and count the benefit twice.
This explains one possible difference, not every difference. The value assigned to the benefit should come from the employer's records. Employee-paid premiums are a separate item; do not confuse your own payroll deduction with the employer-paid benefit.
Ask payroll a question they can answer
I called with the two box numbers and the exact difference. "Can you reconcile box 14 to box A and show me which benefits explain it?" was a better question than "Which slip is wrong?"
If the employer identifies an error, ask about an amended slip and keep both the old and corrected versions identifiable. If a return was already filed, review whether a correction is needed for one administration or both. A changed Quebec slip does not justify changing a federal figure without checking its treatment.
The explanation in my file was the health plan. My salary had not increased while I ate lunch. I saved the reconciliation anyway, because next year's version of me will probably ask the same question.
Checked October 20, 2026. This is a box-treatment example, not a calculation of anyone's tax liability. For the filing steps, see Quebec's two-return process. For an absent document, see what to do when a T4 is missing.
