Before you start

Social Insurance Number
T4 slips from employers
Records of foreign income and foreign property
A determination of the date you became a tax resident

Step-by-step

1
Establish the date you became a tax resident
Canadian tax residency turns on residential ties — a home, a spouse, dependants, then secondary ties such as bank accounts and a driving licence — rather than on a day count. Your first return covers only the part of the year after that date.
OnlineWho: You
2
File one return by 30 April, covering both governments
Saskatchewan tax is calculated on the federal return and collected by the CRA. Certified software is free for most situations and free volunteer clinics exist for modest incomes, which many newcomers qualify for in their first year. File even for a short part-year, because the assessed return is what triggers the GST/HST credit, the Canada Child Benefit and the provincial credits that ride on it.
OnlineWho: YouBy 30 April
3
Learn which things carry PST and which do not
Saskatchewan did not harmonise. GST is 5% and applies broadly; PST is 6% and applies to its own list with its own exemptions, and the two overlap without matching. Basic groceries are exempt from both; a restaurant meal, a services invoice and a used vehicle are all treated differently. Anyone arriving from Ontario, where a single 13% HST applies to almost everything, will get the first month's arithmetic wrong in both directions.
OnlineWho: You
4
Check the basic personal amount before assuming your take-home
Saskatchewan has been raising its basic personal amount in steps, which lifts the income at which provincial tax starts and matters most at lower and middle incomes. The provincial rate table and the personal amount both change with the budget, so run the current year's numbers rather than a figure from an older article.
OnlineWho: You
5
Set up the municipal property tax if you buy
The City of Saskatoon levies property tax on a provincially assessed value, with a monthly pre-authorised payment option that most owners use. There is no municipal land transfer tax in Saskatchewan and no vacant unit tax of the kind Toronto, Ottawa and Hamilton run, so the closing costs on a purchase here are markedly lower than in Ontario.
OnlineWho: You
6
Report foreign property above the threshold on form T1135
Residents holding specified foreign property costing more than CAD 100,000 in total must file this each year. Penalties for non-filing are severe and applied per year, and a property you still own abroad is the usual trigger.
OnlineWho: You
7
Register for CRA My Account once you have filed
This is where tax slips, benefit payments and refunds live. Registration requires information from a filed return, so most newcomers complete it after the first filing rather than before.
OnlineWho: You

Documents you’ll need

Social Insurance Number
T4 and other information slips
Records of foreign income, accounts and property
Property assessment notice and tax bill, if you own
Receipts for medical expenses, childcare and tuition

Things most newcomers don’t know

The tax comparison people make is income tax, and the one that changes the arithmetic here is the absence of transfer taxes.

Saskatchewan's income tax is meaningfully lighter than Ontario's or BC's, which is the headline. The less-discussed part is what is missing: no municipal land transfer tax anywhere in the province, no provincial land transfer tax of the British Columbia kind, no foreign-buyer surcharge, no vacant unit tax and no speculation tax. On a purchase that is thousands of dollars of closing cost that simply does not exist here, and it is invisible in any comparison built from income tax rates alone.

Source: Canada Revenue Agency; Government of Saskatchewan

PST and GST are not one tax, and 11% is a simplification that is wrong in both directions.

Ontario's 13% HST is a single tax applied to almost everything, so people arriving from there mentally add 13% to any price. In Saskatchewan the 5% GST and the 6% PST apply to overlapping but different things, with their own exemptions, so some purchases carry both, some carry one and some carry neither. Read the receipts for the first month rather than assuming a flat percentage.

Source: Government of Saskatchewan — provincial sales tax

The basic personal amount has been moving, so old take-home calculators are stale.

Saskatchewan has been raising the income threshold at which provincial tax starts in steps, which changes net pay most at lower and middle incomes — exactly the range a newcomer's first Canadian job often sits in. An online calculator or a blog post using a figure from two budgets ago will understate what you keep. Run the current year's table.

Source: Government of Saskatchewan

File a part-year return even if you earned almost nothing.

The assessed return is what starts the benefit machinery — the GST/HST credit, the Canada Child Benefit and the provincial credits. Newcomers who arrive in October reasonably conclude there is no point filing for three months of income, and then wonder for a year why no benefit payments arrive. The return is the trigger, not the income.

Source: CRA — Newcomers to Canada

Common mistakes to avoid

Adding 13% to every price out of Ontario habit — Saskatchewan's two taxes apply to different things.
Using a take-home calculator with an out-of-date basic personal amount.
Skipping the first part-year return and forfeiting the benefit entitlements it triggers.
Assuming a 183-day rule determines when you became a tax resident.
Budgeting Ontario or BC closing costs on a Saskatchewan purchase — the transfer taxes do not exist here.
Missing form T1135 on foreign property costing more than CAD 100,000.

Some of this may be out of date. Spotted something inaccurate? Help us keep it right for the next newcomer.