You are a sole proprietor with employees in construction if you meet the following criteria:
- you are the only owner of your business (a non-incorporated business with no partners)
- you operate alone, except for the people you hire as employees
- your business performs Class G construction work (see details in the employer classification manual).
This means that the Workplace Safety and Insurance Act requires your business to have workplace injury or illness coverage with us and you will have to report your earnings and pay premiums to us.
Exemption from expanded compulsory coverage
You are exempt from expanded compulsory coverage if the construction work your company does is limited to only home renovations and you are always hired and paid by the homeowner or resident. However, you must still have coverage for your employees.
Calculating insurable earnings
Businesses in construction must calculate the amount of insurance premiums they owe, and report and pay the amount to us. The calculation of premiums is based on the gross wages paid to the employees who you are responsible for insuring, which is called insurable earnings.
Premium = Insurable earnings x premium rate ÷ 100
Here’s how:
- Use the earnings you reported to the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) last year to estimate your earnings for this year. You will find this number on line 135 of the T1 General form you submitted to the CRA.
- Divide the amount of line 135 of the T1 General by the number of times you report in a year (e.g. quarterly or monthly). How often you report is found in the letter you received from the WSIB when you first registered your business with us, and is called “your reporting period.”
- Add this figure to your employees’ gross wages for the reporting period. This figure represents your insurable earnings.
- Multiply your insurable earnings by the premium rate found on your premium rate statement.
- Divide this number by 100. This will give you your total premium payable for the reporting period.
- If you have just started your business, you can use (as a minimum) 33.3 per cent of the annual insurable earnings maximum as an estimate for your insurable earnings. You may use this figure and add it to your employees’ gross wages.
- If your actual earnings turn out to be different than the amount you reported, please contact us as soon as possible.
Premiums
Reporting and paying premiums is a two-step process. You can easily report and pay your premiums through our online services. You can also contact us with any questions you may have; our team is here to help.
For more information see: