You must apply to your Employment Insurance benefits as soon as the day after you have stopped working.

EI allows up to 3 weeks grace period for a late application to be processed based on the day after your last day worked. This will set the starting week of your EI benefits. Therefore,  you will be paid retroactively between the weeks you stopped working.

If you have missed the 3 weeks grace period, your EI will begin as of the week you filed your delayed EI application. You will not be paid those missing weeks.

On time EI application explained

(Waiting Period is now 1 week)

Delayed EI application explained

(Waiting Period is now 1 week)

A delayed application will result into reduced benefit weeks and weekly entitlement amounts. The problem with delayed EI application (beyond 3 weeks grace period) is that all your insurable hours and earnings are all pushed weeks down to the future, where there are zero insurable earnings and hours. It will dramatically bring down the average insurance hours and earnings, which will result into less entitlement weeks and weekly benefit amounts. 

How to request your EI benefits to be back dated?

In a situation where you have delayed your EI application with good cause or caused due to a situation that’s out of your control, you may submit the EI Antedate form to explain to the EI processing agent the reason of your delayed application. To do so, you must download the form online (INS 2987) then completed by hand.

Once completed, make sure to mail the form to EI processing office or to submit it at your nearest Service Canada centre. The EI processing agent with then review your application with antedate request and decide if your claim can be processed retroactively. If the decision is to your favor, your claim will be pushed back to its original starting week.

You will then be able to complete multiple past report to bring your report up to date. Once those report were completed, you will get those retroactive payments all at once.

Sometimes you may call EI call centre to have an agent to complete the past reports all together as well.

To read more about Antedate topic…