An Airdrie, Alta., couple, Daria Skibington-Roffel and her husband Ron Roffel, say the Canada Revenue Agency is demanding repayment of roughly $33,000 in pandemic benefits. Skibington-Roffel collected CERB and recovery benefits after her hours were cut, and maintains the agency’s own application tools said she was eligible.
A refund that never came
Skibington-Roffel works part-time while living with chronic health issues, and she is the official caregiver for her husband, who is retired and disabled. During the pandemic she applied for the Canada Emergency Response Benefit and later the Canada Recovery Benefit after her work hours and salary were reduced, checking her eligibility against the federal questionnaire.
“We needed the money and for the first time ever, we were actually able to pay all the bills every month instead of sacrificing one for another every month,” she said.
The trouble surfaced in 2021, when the tax refund she normally uses to pay property taxes never arrived. She says the CRA told her she had not qualified for CERB because her income was too high and she had worked too many hours, and that she owed $14,000. After two years of fighting, she received another letter saying she had not qualified for other benefits either, and that the bill had grown to around $50,000. The balance has since fallen by more than $10,000 — not because the agency relented, but because it has withheld years of her tax refunds and rebates, including caregiver rebates.
Two appeals have failed. The couple say they have taken out loans, nearly lost their home twice, and now face the prospect of insolvency. “I claimed a benefit and I would do it again,” Skibington-Roffel said. “I filled out all their little questionnaires and their calculator things and all that stuff and we were eligible.”
One file in a $10-billion recovery effort
The Roffels’ fight is one of hundreds of thousands. The CRA has said it is working to recover more than $10 billion in COVID-19 benefits paid as overpayments or to people later deemed ineligible. As of Nov. 30, the agency said it had disbursed $83.5 billion in pandemic benefits, including $45.3 billion in CERB, and that close to 1.4 million people had repaid about $3.3 billion.
Spokesperson Nina Ioussoupova said the agency takes “firm and responsible” measures against people who avoid paying what they owe. “If it is determined that a taxpayer has the ability to pay their debt in full and it remains unpaid without an acceptable payment arrangement, the CRA may take legal action to recover the debt,” she said, listing refund offsets, wage garnishment and other tools.
Ron Roffel argues the income threshold used to judge eligibility was unrealistic and that it changed during the process, disqualifying people like his wife after the fact. “This has been a huge stress for my husband and me,” Skibington-Roffel said, adding she earns just over $30,000 a year. “We’ve had to go into debt and we’re probably going to have to either go insolvent or bankrupt again just because of this.”
Why so many reassessments are disputed
Tax lawyers say the pattern in cases like this one was baked in from the start. Ottawa pushed money out quickly in 2020, relying on applicants’ attestations, and verified eligibility years later — often turning on technical questions such as whether income counted toward the CERB’s $5,000 earnings threshold. According to legal analyses of the recovery campaign, more than 3,500 Canadians have contested repayment orders and more than 1,000 have sought judicial review in Federal Court, with some winning on procedural-fairness grounds.
The couple is asking the CRA to stop the clawbacks and return what has been withheld. The agency does not comment on individual files, and had not provided a further response on their case.
