Do I have to return EI sick payment when I receive DI payment?

Hi there,

Does anyone has experience regarding EI sick leave benefits? Do you have to return this payment once you receive the DI payment?

Thanks in advance!

Hi
I think I might have an answer for you as dealt with this very issue.
Depending on your LTD policy you probably have 13 -15 week elimination period after which your LTD will start. Your sickness EI usually covers only 15 weeks, so if this is the situation, then you are OK.
But in case they overlap for some reason, you have to establish over payment with EI and then pay back whatever is owed.
In my situation I had over payment by EI and had to call Service Canada and now there is a balance I have to pay back to EI
Hope it helps

1 Like

We see this all the time.

The key here is the overlap period. You look at all the weeks you received EI sickness. Then if you also received wages or wage replacement benefits during any of those same weeks, then it results in an “overpayment” of EI and you need to reimburse EI.

One thing that has come up a few times is that EI has flexibility for the 15 week period they use for your disability. Sometimes they will just use the date when you apply for EI, when in fact you could have back dated your application and received benefits for a earlier period, that won’t overlap with other benefits you received. We have had EI voluntarily change the dates after the fact to allow the person not to have an overlap. In that case, our client had used a later start date for EI sickness so ti cased the benefits to overlap with LTD benefits once the LTD was later approved. We simply got EI to retroactively change the EI benefit period to start when her disability started and this removed the overlap. This was not easy to do and I am not sure they will do it in all cases.


David Brannen

Disability Lawyer with Resolute Legal

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