Workers

You are owed an adjustment payment if you received any of the following benefits between July 1, 2016 and December 31, 2022:

• Wage-loss benefits, including temporary earnings loss (TEL) and extended earnings loss(EEL) – while off work or participating in a return-to-work or labour market re-entry plan
• Retirement benefits, excluding pension replacement benefits (PRB)
• Dependency benefits

An adjustment is not required for any benefits paid in 2023.

An adjustment is not required for pension replacement benefits (PRB), travel reimbursements or lump-sum permanent functional impairment payments paid between July 1, 2016 and December 31, 2022.

At this point, we do not have details on how much each worker will receive – we are now calculating that back to July 1, 2016. We expect to start to issue payments in late June 2023.

In the meantime, we can provide the following summary information:

The amount of the adjustment depends on what your weekly benefit was, how long your claim was open, if you had offsets (such as CPP disability) and other factors.

As an estimate, most people will receive about $2.00 or less for each week they received benefits, and most will receive less than $120 in total. As examples, you may receive approximately:

• $2.00 or less if you received benefits for a week or less
• $30 or less if you received benefits for up to 13 weeks
• $120 or less if you received benefits for up to 52 weeks

If you received benefits for the full period, from July 1, 2016 and December 31, 2022, you may receive up to $780.

We expect to start issuing payments by late June 2023.

We need time to calculate the adjustment back to July 1, 2016. We thank you for your patience as we take the time to ensure our calculations are correct.

If you have moved since receiving your last benefit payment, please update your address online using MyWorkplaceNL.

This will help us issue your payment when we have finished calculating the adjustments.

If you had more than one claim open between July 1, 2016 and December 31, 2022, an adjustment applies to all claims in that period that received the benefits noted above.

If you have a balance owing to WorkplaceNL, we will deduct the amount we owe you from the balance you owe us.

There is no adjustment for 2023. The adjustment is for certain benefits paid between July 1, 2016 and December 31, 2022 only.

No, you will not have to re-file taxes for previous years. The amount you receive will be included on the T5007 slips issued for the 2023 taxation year.

Our condolences for your loss. If your family member has passed since their last benefit payment from WorkplaceNL, please contact us at info@workplacenl.ca or 1.709.778.6980.

Our claims payment system was not updated when the non-refundable provincial tax credit changed from 7.7 to 8.7 per cent on July 1, 2016 – therefore we used an incorrect amount to determine a probable deduction from your gross earnings when calculating your wage-loss benefits.

We apologize for the error, and are working to quickly calculate the amount we owe workers. We expect to provide affected workers with more details starting in late June 2023.

We are not changing any PRIME charges or refunds you have already received.

We are analyzing the impact the adjustment payments may have on employers’ future PRIME experience results, and expect to have more information available starting in late June.

There is no impact for 2023 or 2024 assessment rates.

The adjustment payments will be a factor in assessment rates starting in 2025.

Assessment rates are set for industry groups – not individual employers – and factor the groups’ cost experience over the previous five years (excluding the most recent year). So, 2025 will be the first year the cost of the benefit adjustments will be included.

The exact impact is not known at this time. The assessment rate for 2025 will be announced in the Fall of 2024.