If your T4A process starts with searching your inbox, you’re not alone.
For many organizations, contractor information lives in:
• Email threads
• Text messages
• Old spreadsheets
• Someone’s personal notes
That works—until year-end, when “Where is that SIN?” and “Which address is current?” become urgent questions.
This article walks through how to move from email chaos to organized, centralized contractor data that makes T4A season much easier.
Why email is a terrible database
Email is great for conversation but terrible as a system of record. When you rely on it for T4A data, you end up with:
• Multiple versions of the same information
• No easy way to see what’s missing
• High risk of overlooking a contractor entirely
• Painful manual copy-paste into spreadsheets or forms
It also makes you dependent on specific people who “remember” which thread has what. If they’re out or leave, the knowledge goes with them.
Step 1: decide where your “single source of truth” will live
The first step out of chaos is choosing a home for your contractor data. That could be:
• Your accounting/ERP system
• A simple CRM or HR system
• A dedicated T4A tool like T4ASlip
The key isn’t which system you choose—it’s that you choose one place to be your official record. From now on, if a question comes up, you check the system first, not your inbox.
Step 2: define the minimum data you’ll store
To support T4As, you don’t need a huge profile for each contractor. Focus on essentials:
• Legal name or business name
• Mailing address
• Email address
• SIN or business number (when applicable)
• Whether they are an individual or corporation
• A short description of the services they provide
This is the information you’ll rely on for slips, so make it part of your standard onboarding.
Step 3: change how you collect data going forward
To stop creating new email chaos, change the front door:
• Use a short contractor onboarding form (online or PDF)
• Ask contractors to complete it once at the start of the relationship
• Store submissions directly in your chosen system (or import them regularly)
If contractors send details by email anyway, treat that as temporary:
• Copy the data into your system
• Mark their record as “complete” once all fields are filled
• Avoid relying on the email again once the system is updated
Over time, more and more of your T4A data lives in your system, not in scattered messages.
Step 4: migrate the most important contractors first
You don’t have to clean up everything at once.
Start with:
• Contractors you paid this year and expect to pay again
• High-value or high-frequency contractors
• Anyone you know will need a T4A slip under CRA rules
For each one:
• Search your email one last time
• Confirm their current details
• Create or update their profile in your system or T4ASlip
You’ll quickly build a solid core of clean records that cover most of your T4A volume.
Step 5: connect payment data to contractor profiles
Centralized profiles are powerful—but only if they link to payments. In T4ASlip, for example, you can:
• Import contractor profiles
• Import payment data from your accounting system
• Match payments to the right contractor automatically or with light review
• See total amounts per contractor for the tax year
Now, instead of asking “Who did we pay?” and searching through email, you open your T4ASlip view and see everything in one place.
Step 6: use your system as the starting point for T4A season
Once you’ve centralized data, T4A season looks different:
Before:
• Search email
• Rebuild lists in a spreadsheet
• Chase basic info in February
After:
• Log into your system or T4ASlip
• See contractors and totals for the year
• Fix only the exceptions (missing or changed info)
• Generate slips from a clean dataset
You’re not reinventing the wheel every year—you’re extending and refining a dataset you already trust.
Common concerns (and why they’re manageable)
“Won’t this take a lot of time to set up?”
There’s an upfront effort, but you can focus on the contractors that matter most and build from there. Every record you centralize is one less inbox search next year.
“What about security and privacy?”
Centralizing data often improves security. It’s easier to secure one system properly than dozens of email inboxes and spreadsheets.
“What if people don’t fill out the forms?”
They might not at first—but when you explain that T4A slips and timely payments depend on complete information, most contractors cooperate. A gentle but clear policy goes a long way.
How T4ASlip helps you centralize
T4ASlip can act as that central hub by:
• Storing contractor profiles and tax details
• Importing payment records from your existing tools
• Highlighting missing or inconsistent data in one place
• Providing a T4A-ready view when filing season arrives
Instead of using email as the case file, you use T4ASlip as the organized “folder” where everything lives.
From chaos to control
Centralizing contractor data isn’t glamorous work—but it’s the foundation that turns T4A season from an inbox nightmare into a manageable project.
If you:
• Choose a single system of record
• Standardize what you collect
• Migrate key contractors first
• Connect profiles to payments
…then year after year, you’ll see less chaos, fewer errors, and a lot fewer late-night searches for that one email from months ago.