Transport Canada’s Policy on remissions

A “remission” is the reimbursement of part of a fee paid for a service when we don’t meet our services standard. This policy reinforces accountability around service delivery and helps us set meaningful and realistic service expectations.

In line with the Service Fees Act and Treasury Board policies, Transport Canada:

  • creates a service standard for all services with fees, and
  • compares our performance to the standard on a monthly basis to make sure we are meeting our targets.

When we don’t meet our service standards, we may pay you a remission.

On this page

Eligible fees

We apply the remission policy to all material fees based on the criteria in the Low-materiality Fees Regulations. You can search Transport Canada’s Service Fees for information about service fees and service standards. When we miss a service standard, we may provide a partial reimbursement.

Calculating remissions

As of April 1, 2023, remissions are calculated using the Remission payout scale.

A reimbursement of up to 30% of the fee paid will be calculated and issued for qualifying remissions based on the table below.

Table 1: Remission payout scale

Tier level

Percentage over standard

Percentage of fee to be reimbursed

Tier 1 0% to 25% 10%
Tier 2 More than 25% and less than or equal to 75% 20%
Tier 3 More than 75% 30%

Issuing remissions

We will calculate remissions every month and if we owe you a remission, we will issue it in the following month. We will process the remission amounts automatically; you do not have to make a request.

The method that we use to pay you the remission will depend on the method that you used to pay for the fee. See the table below for more details.

Table 2: Methods of notification
Method used to pay fee How we will issue remission and inform you
Invoice A credit will be applied to your account and will be shown on your monthly statement.
Online payment – Credit Card Payment A reimbursement will be put back on your credit card and we will email you with details. If the credit card you used to pay a fee is no longer valid, we will be unable to repay you using this method. We will mail you a cheque and a notice to the address on the original receipt.
Online payment – Debit Card Payment We will mail you a cheque and a notice to the address on the original receipt.
Phone payment by credit card We will mail you a cheque and a notice to the address on the original receipt.
Point of sale We will mail you a cheque and a notice to the address on the original receipt.
Cheque We will mail you a cheque and a notice to the address on the original receipt.

Exceptions to applying remission

The remission policy does not apply to:

  • Fees based on availability of a Transport Canada asset or facility. In these cases, you only pay fees when you use or access the asset/facility. Examples include:
    • airport landing services
    • port services
    • parking
  • Fee adjustments to correct a mistake
  • Services that are delayed because of your actions as a service recipient. For example, if service is delayed because you needed to provide additional information, we will adjust our performance results to factor in the delay. If, once your actions are taken into account, we still do not meet the service standard, we will apply a remission
  • Service delays beyond our control. If this happens, we will not include the unforeseen delay when calculating the time it took to deliver the service. Examples include:
    • major weather events
    • complex travel to reach the location where the service is delivered
    • emergencies

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