The PolyBlog

So, let’s rewind the clock about 15 years, when CRA had a previous version of their online accounts. I got one almost immediately, but at the time, they had a peculiar login authentication protocol schedule; if you didn’t use it for three months or something similarly short, it would time out. Well, I only really needed it for income tax purposes, which is what most people needed, so every year, you had to reset your account to get a new password. Whatever, no biggie. Until it was.

One year, it wouldn’t reset me. No matter what I did, I couldn’t log in to my account. Since you can file without accessing your accounts, that wasn’t a big deal. I didn’t really need to access my CRA info; we had it all from last year’s notice of assessment, but it was a bit annoying.

More importantly, when Andrea did our taxes, she would go to do x, y, or z, and it would work great for her, but not as well for me. She could netfile for both of us, but my notice came by mail, while hers was sent electronically. Without access to my account, we couldn’t switch it over.

The two of us would do the same dance each year. She would gather all the forms for both of us and initiate the process, reminding me that she needs to be able to access my account. I would try to authenticate, it would balk; I would tell it to reset, I would get about four to six steps in, just enough that it looked like it was working, and it would balk. I’d try calling and the wait time would be longer than I had to give at the time, and eventually, Andrea would just file it and I would get my NoA by mail. Which we then promptly lose track of in the house as it doesn’t fit our normal filing system — she keeps all the income stuff, while I have some credit card stuff, car finance, etc. However, a NoA always came with a cheque for me to cash, so I would take the form and then intend to activate my account, now that I had the latest information (i.e., it would often ask me what was on line X from my last notice of assessment). So then the form would be with my stuff, but there was no rush to go through the CRA gauntlet, blah blah blah. Next year, same deal. Even with the latest info, the system would NOT let me register.

This year’s the year, today’s the day!

I took a personal day today and didn’t accomplish much. But, about 3:00 today, I got inspired. I decided we would work out once and for all why I can’t register, AND actually get back into my account.

I gave it the old college try on my own first. Tried to reset some stuff, told it I didn’t know my ID or my password, nada worked. I could get about four steps in, and then it would ask me for info I didn’t have. They wanted information from last year’s NOA, which we couldn’t find; we could find 2022, but not 2023. A printout from 2023 would likely have given me the same info, but it said 2022 was sufficient. But then you reach a field, and it only says 2023. There was no option to indicate that it was 2022. I tried the information; it wouldn’t work.

Okay, let’s hit the phone lines! Operators are standing by, call now! Except, no operators WERE standing by. And this one threw me initially.

I got through the initial menus, and it said, “Hey, we don’t have anyone. You can do blah blah blah yourself in the menus, but if it doesn’t work, you’ll have to call back later.” Umm, what? There was no option to go into a queue, as everybody was busy; call back later. I tried again, same answer. WTF? I called twice more and then, dun dun dun, I got a different opening menu. Somebody WAS available. Oh joy, oh bliss, oh joyful bliss!

Well, it was more like they were available in 20 minutes, but still, I got a body.

Who took my info and told me the answer to the first question. Why can’t I get into my account? Because CRA doesn’t think I have one, nor have I ever had one. Somewhere along the line, when they switched systems, my old account didn’t transfer over, so every time I’ve been trying to connect, it has said ‘no’ because I don’t actually have an account anymore.

Now, before you jump to conclusions about my mental state, it only answers half the question. Previously, I have tried to create a new account by clicking on the partner accounts I’m affiliated with, but that never worked either. It’s a bit like clicking on a website and it asks, “Do you want to log in with Apple, Gmail, Facebook,…?” It uses the information from your other account to partially authenticate your account with CRA.

For CRA, often the other partners are banking institutions or an ESDC account with Service Canada (for EI, pensions, etc.). Even using those partner accounts, it wouldn’t let me see my previous-but-now-non-existent account, NOR let me create a new one. Whatever.

With the new person on the line, I said, “I don’t have my 2023 NOA; we can’t find it, and I’m unable to answer the questions it’s asking.”

No problem, and I must admit I found this unusual. Their workaround was not to help me create an account using another method; their solution was to verbally confirm my identity by asking some security questions based on 2022, plus some other information, accept that it was me, and then tell me the answers to the questions when I was creating my account. Surprisingly, when they provided the expected answers, the system accepted them. 🙂

And the help kept on coming. She asked me which method I wanted to use to create my new account — hinting at what the easiest one would be. I went sideways on that one, as I’ve had problems with the other two methods in the past, but on three future prompts, she basically told me which one worked the best. Not telling me which one I **had** to choose, but leading me by the nose quite handily.

Then the REAL fun began. First, I had to give it a new username and password… except it doesn’t like special characters; it’s very vanilla-like. It likes numbers and uppercase. No worries, I can handle that. I was fussing over my new username, but she offered a couple of suggestions that worked well. Secondly, I had to choose backup security questions. Except these ones are like the banking questions on steroids. Things like, “What was the first major purchase you made as an adult?”. That is NOT a standard prompt, I like it! Five choices later, I had made my decision.

Then I just had to get authenticated on my phone, have them send me a secure link, upload a picture of my driver’s license, upload a selfie, turn myself around three times under a blood moon, and chant RedRum three times, and it authenticated me for my new account. Several clicks later, I was fully IN my account.

And I have my NetFile access code, so we can file properly via NetFile. I just need to adjust my settings to set up direct deposit before we file.

It took about 35 minutes to do everything, which is about half the time I’ve spent on it each year for the last five or six years trying to get it to work. I feel like I got lucky with the phone lines this year, and about half the battle was just narrowing it down to whether I was trying to access an existing account or create a new one. She did note that it appeared I had indeed attempted to access and register on multiple occasions, without success, but it didn’t explain why I was stopped previously. She was really quite helpful overall, and things ran relatively smoothly.

This year, I quacked like a duck, she taught me how to quack better, and the IT system let me into the pond. Yay me! Now, hopefully, my wife will stop envisioning stabbing me with a fork.

And, wonders of wonders, I didn’t once mention that the hackers who stole information from 28K accounts had an easier time getting in than I did.