To help with the costs of post-secondary education, Revenu Québec offers a tax credit for parents with children under 18 who’re post-secondary full-time students. This tax credit reduces your tax payable if you had a dependant child who meets both these conditions:
- Your child was under 18 throughout that year (born after December 31, 1998)
- Your child was a full-time student pursuing vocational training or post-secondary studies.
You can claim $2,130 for each completed term that the child began in 2016, up to a maximum of two terms per child. The amount that you can claim is shown on the RL-8 slip issued to your child by the school he or she attended.
Note: If your child went to a school outside of Québec, contact Revenu Québec to request a blank RL-8 slip. You can then have the registrar of that school complete the slip.
If your child had income during the year that wasn’t from scholarships, bursaries, fellowships, or prizes or from the deduction for residents of designated remote areas, 80% of the child’s income will be deducted from the claimable amount.
Children under 18 with a spouse
Generally, you can still claim the amount for a child under 18 enrolled in post-secondary studies if your child has a spouse on December 31. However, you won’t be able to claim this amount if your child is transferring credits to his or her spouse to be claimed on their return.
Can I split this amount?
If you and another person (such as your spouse) financially supported your child, you can split the credit amount in any proportion you like, as long as it doesn’t exceed the maximum claimable.
Where do I claim this?
H&R Block’s tax software automatically calculates and adds this amount to your return if you have completed a return for your dependant who is under the age of 18 and received an RL-8 slip.
If you’re preparing your return together with your spouse or common-law partner, the software applies the tax credit to the spouse with the higher income. You can choose to have the lower income spouse claim this amount on the Education transfers page under the OPTIMIZATION icon on the WRAP-UP tab.
