Fax a Regulation 105 Waiver to the CRA (Form R105)

Last updated October 3, 2026 · Fax numbers, addresses and the 30-day rule were read from canada.ca on October 3, 2026. We are not affiliated with the Canada Revenue Agency and nothing here is tax or legal advice.

A Regulation 105 waiver application (Form R105) goes to the CRA’s International Waivers Centre of Expertise, which publishes fax 1-833-329-1160 from Canada and the United States and 418-566-0323 from elsewhere. The CRA asks for it at least 30 days before the services in Canada begin or before the first payment. If you hold a CRA account you can upload it instead through Submit Documents.

What Regulation 105 does, in one paragraph

When a Canadian payer pays a non-resident for services rendered in Canada, the Income Tax Act and its regulations require the payer to withhold and remit an amount from that payment. The CRA describes the Regulation 105 rate as 15% of the gross fee where no treaty relief applies. The money is withheld from the fee, not added to it, so a non-resident contractor who expected the full invoice is paid 85% of it.

A waiver application asks the CRA to reduce or waive that withholding before the payment is made — Form R105, Regulation 105 Waiver Application, which the CRA describes as the form used “if you are a non-resident self-employed individual or corporation”. Whether a waiver is available to you, and on what treaty basis, is a tax question. We are not answering it; the CRA pages in the Sources section are.

The 30-day rule is the whole game

The CRA’s guidelines for treaty-based Regulation 105 waivers state that applications should be submitted “at least 30 days prior to the commencement of the services in Canada or 30 days prior to the initial payment for the related services”, and that the CRA “is committed to processing all waiver submissions received 30 days or more prior to the commencement of, or payment for, the services in Canada, provided all the required documentation and information is included”.

Inside the 30 days, processing in time may not be possible, although the CRA says it will make efforts to accommodate properly documented submissions. The practical reading: the clock, not the channel, is what usually goes wrong — and when you are already late, the channel starts to matter a great deal.

The three published routes, compared

Ways to send a Regulation 105 waiver application to the CRA
Route	What the CRA publishes	When it is the right choice
Submit Documents online	My Account, My Business Account or Represent a Client → Submit Documents → “Send request for a waiver of withholding (Regulation 102 and 105, RC473) and supporting documents”. Up to 500 MB total, ten files per session.	You already have a CRA account. It gives you a CRA-side record.
Fax	International Waivers Centre of Expertise: 1-833-329-1160 from Canada and the United States, 418-566-0323 from outside Canada and the United States.	No CRA account — the usual position of a non-resident filing a first waiver — or you want a time-stamped transmission record you hold yourself.
Mail	Regional addresses: Charlottetown PE (Atlantic), Montréal QC (Quebec), Ottawa ON (Ontario and Nunavut), Edmonton AB (Prairie region and NWT), Surrey BC (British Columbia and Yukon), with separate addresses for regular and certified or registered mail.	Bulky originals, or when you need registered-mail proof of delivery and have the time.

Do not use email. The CRA’s own guidance says you should never send confidential information such as a Social Insurance Number or tax return details by email.

Waivers, or Section 116? They are different desks

The CRA runs two neighbouring centres of expertise and their fax numbers differ by a single digit, which is an easy and expensive mistake:

International Waivers Centre of Expertise — Regulation 102 and 105 waiver applications and non-resident employer certification. Fax 1-833-329-1160, or 418-566-0323 from outside Canada and the US.
Section 116 Centre of Expertise — dispositions of taxable Canadian property by non-residents. Fax 1-833-329-1161, or 418-566-0324 from outside Canada and the US.

Read the last digit twice before you send. See faxing the CRA for the rest of the published numbers.

How to fax the R105, step by step

Confirm the deadline before anything else. The CRA asks for the application at least 30 days before services in Canada begin, or 30 days before the first payment for them. It commits to processing submissions that arrive 30 days or more ahead with complete documentation. If you are inside 30 days, the choice of channel matters more than usual: international mail is unlikely to make it.
Download the current Form R105 from canada.ca. Form R105, Regulation 105 Waiver Application, is the form for a non-resident self-employed individual or corporation seeking relief from Regulation 105 withholding. Take it from canada.ca rather than a third-party copy so you are filing the current version.
Assemble the supporting documentation. The CRA requires clear and concise information and documentation supporting the reasons for the waiver — typically evidence of residence in a treaty country and entitlement to treaty benefits, plus the service contract, schedule and particulars of the work being done in Canada. Follow the CRA's own list for your circumstances.
Check whether Submit Documents is open to you. If you hold a CRA account, Submit Documents in My Account, My Business Account or Represent a Client accepts this application directly under “Send request for a waiver of withholding (Regulation 102 and 105, RC473) and supporting documents”, up to 500 MB and ten files per session. Use it if you can; it gives you a CRA-side record.
Pick the correct fax number for where you are. The International Waivers Centre of Expertise publishes 1-833-329-1160 for senders in Canada and the United States, and 418-566-0323 for senders outside Canada and the United States. A toll-free 1-833 number dialled from Europe or Asia often will not complete, so use the 418 number from outside North America.
Build a cover sheet the centre can route. Address it to the International Waivers Centre of Expertise, name the form (R105), the non-resident's full legal name and any CRA identification or business number, the payer, the contract and service period, your callback number and email, and the total page count including the cover sheet.
Send it and keep the transmission result. Upload the PDF, enter the number in full, send. Keep the result showing the number dialled, the page count and the completion time — with a 30-day rule, the date you can prove is the date that counts. The CRA does not fax an acknowledgement back.

Sending it from outside Canada

This is the common case: a US or European business engaged to deliver work in Canada, with no Canadian phone line and no fax machine. You do not need either. Canadian numbers share the North American Numbering Plan with the US, so 1-833-329-1160 is dialled like any +1 number, and an online fax service places the call from a browser. usfax.com sends to US and Canadian numbers today, which covers both of the agencies in this cluster. More in faxing a North American agency from abroad.

One caution worth repeating: from outside North America, use the 418-566-0323 number the CRA publishes for exactly that case. Toll-free 1-8xx numbers are frequently unreachable from foreign networks, and the CRA publishes the alternative precisely because of it.

Why you may want your own fax number, not just a send

A waiver application is the start of a correspondence, not the end of one. The CRA may come back for more documentation. A fax carries no reply address, so anything faxed back goes to the number that placed the original call — if that was a shared sending line, it does not reach you. A dedicated number means the reply arrives as a PDF in your email wherever you are.

One application and nothing expected back: $2.99 for up to 10 pages, no number, no subscription. Expecting follow-up, or filing waivers for every contract: Solo at $19 a month ($15 billed annually), one dedicated US number, 300 pages, 7-day trial, no card. Pricing has the rest, and what is a fax number covers the basics if this is new.

Frequently asked questions

Regulation 105 of Canada's Income Tax Regulations requires a payer to withhold tax from fees paid to a non-resident for services rendered in Canada. The CRA describes the rate as 15% of the gross fee where no treaty relief applies. A waiver application asks the CRA to reduce or waive that withholding — typically on the basis of a tax treaty — so the non-resident is paid without the deduction. The form is R105, Regulation 105 Waiver Application.

To the CRA's International Waivers Centre of Expertise. The CRA publishes fax 1-833-329-1160 from Canada and the United States and 418-566-0323 from outside Canada and the United States, on its page for where to send completed waiver and non-resident employer certification applications. The same numbers appear on the CRA's tax services offices and tax centres page.

The CRA's guidelines for treaty-based waivers say applications should be submitted “at least 30 days prior to the commencement of the services in Canada or 30 days prior to the initial payment for the related services”, and that the CRA is committed to processing submissions received 30 days or more ahead provided all required documentation is included. Inside that window it may not be possible to process the application in time, though the CRA says it will try where the submission is properly documented.

Yes, if you have a CRA account. Through Submit Documents in My Account, My Business Account or Represent a Client, select “Send request for a waiver of withholding (Regulation 102 and 105, RC473) and supporting documents” and attach up to 500 MB, ten files per session. Non-residents filing a first waiver often have no CRA account, which is exactly when fax or mail is the practical route.

Both concern withholding on amounts paid to non-residents, and the same CRA centre of expertise handles waiver applications for both — which is why the Submit Documents option names them together. Regulation 105 concerns fees, commissions and other amounts paid for services rendered in Canada by a non-resident; the Regulation 102 waiver route concerns employment remuneration. Which applies to your situation is a tax question for the CRA or your adviser, not for us.

Yes. The CRA publishes regional mailing addresses for waiver applications: Charlottetown PE for the Atlantic region, Montréal QC for Quebec, Ottawa ON for Ontario and Nunavut, Edmonton AB for the Prairie region and the Northwest Territories, and Surrey BC for British Columbia and Yukon, each with separate addresses for regular and certified or registered mail. Given the 30-day rule, international post is the riskiest of the three routes.

To send it, no — you fax the CRA's number. But correspondence about a waiver can come back, and a fax reply goes to the number that placed the original call, so a shared sending number cannot receive it. If this is a one-off application, usfax.com Pay Per Fax is $2.99 for up to 10 pages with no number. If you expect follow-up, Solo is $19 a month ($15 billed annually) with one dedicated US number and 300 pages.

The CRA's guidelines require “clear and concise information and documentation which support the reasons for the waiver request” — in practice, material establishing residence in a treaty country and entitlement to treaty benefits, together with the contract, schedule and details of the services being performed in Canada. The CRA's published list for your situation governs; we are not in a position to tell you what satisfies it.

Get a US fax number in under a minute

Pick a US number, send your first fax from the browser, and get a delivery receipt. Solo is $19 a month ($15 billed annually) with 1 number and 300 pages, and starts with a 7-day free trial, no card. Sending one document and never again? Pay Per Fax is $2.99 for up to 10 pages, no subscription and no number.