When Can I Apply for Hiring Grants in Canada?

If your company wants to expand your team, there are many Canadian government hiring grants you can take advantage of to keep your business projects moving forward.
There is a lot of funding available to hire people under 30 years old because a big priority for the federal and provincial governments is to give young people meaningful employment. It doesn’t matter what industry you’re in, whether you run a restaurant, construction business or consultancy. If your company meets the criteria, you can be eligible for a Canadian government business grant.

See our previous post of our clients who received $10,000 to $20,000 worth of hiring grants!

Are Canadian hiring grants seasonal?

There are some government grants that have opened up at certain times of the year for consecutive years. Some hiring grants are available for fall hires because recent grads are ready to start a new job. The time grants open can vary province to province. 
The Get Working Youth Program is an example of a grant that usually opens in the second quarter and it has mostly been renewed on time every year. Here are the details of the Get Working Youth Program:

• Value: $2,800 wage subsidy and $1,000 external training per person who is 24 years old or under to support virtually any full-time position in an organization.
• Employees must not be enrolled in full-time studies and cannot be returning to full-time studies after the subsidy term is complete.
• Amount of time to hear a decision from the grant funders: 5 days. 

The most predictable hiring grants are those that hire co-ops students because their work terms align with their school semesters. The Canada Summer Jobs program is the only summer hiring grant at the moment and companies can apply for funding in December and January. Canada Summer Jobs only accept applications for a limited time and close so they can decide which businesses are awarded hiring grants before the summer. 
Don’t worry about keeping track of all of these deadlines! Companies that don’t have time to keep an eye out for all of the different government grants simply rely on our wonderful government grant experts to take care of all of the monitoring and applications. This way, they never miss out on getting thousands, if not tens of thousands of dollars, for their businesses.

Are employment grants a reliable source of cash flow?

Never assume that grant funding will always be available for future years. Canadian government business grants can close anytime as the government changes priorities or if not enough companies apply for funding when they were open. Businesses should not rely on government grants as a stable source of cash flow but rather think of them as a way to enhance the business activities they are already doing.

Examples of Canadian government business grants

Digital WIL Program (Canada-wide)
Work Integrated Learning (WIL) allows university students to get work paid work experience in their field of study. WIL Digital works to develop talent for the emerging ICT sectors, support businesses, and increase digital adoption in Canada. Here are some key facts about WIL Digital:

• Government grant: WIL Digital Program, Information and Communications Technology Council 
• General stream: 50% of wages up to $5,000
• Underrepresented groups: 70% of wages up to $7,000 (first year students, female students, recent immigrants who have in the last 5 years, indigenous students or persons with disabilities)
• Time to hear back about the grant decision: 2 weeks

This program provides a wage subsidy of up to $7,000 for internships in the following technology sub-industries:

• Intelligent Retailing (E-Commerce)
• Advanced Manufacturing
• Fintech
• Entertainment & Gaming
• Cybersecurity
• Connected Transportation
• Biotechnology
• E-Health
• Clean Technology

Between 50% and 70% of a new employee’s salary is offered for post-secondary students in STEM or business. The position must be no more than 16 weeks in duration and must either have an IT or business focus.
Agri-Food Youth Employment and Skills Program (Canada-wide)

• Government grant: Youth Employment and Skills Program, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada
• Value: $14,000 to provide meaningful career-related agricultural work experience to someone aged 30 or under
• Requirements: The employee must not be a previous full-time employee of the company or participated in other Youth Employment programs
• Eligible participants: Canadian citizens, permanent residents or refugees

The internship must be between 4 to 12 months and the employer must provide on-the-job mentorship and support. 

Do I have to hire someone before receiving an employment grant?

Before you put someone on your payroll, it’s best to call the grant program contact to ask about your chances of receiving the grant before starting the hiring process. You can find the contact information on the program’s website. 
A company may not be awarded funding because the applicant either missed the deadline, doesn’t qualify or all of the funding was awarded. Government hiring grants can come and go pretty quickly because funding decisions are made between 5 days to 2 weeks from the time they receive an application. 
To avoid spending a lot of time going through the hiring process and possibly missing a deadline, you can simply call the program contact and let them know that you have a great candidate. You can ask what your chances are of being awarded the grant if the person is hired by the date you specify.
To summarize, here are the steps you can follow to maximize your chances of securing a hiring grant:

1. Call the funding program’s contact to ask about your chances for qualifying for the grant. Before calling, it’s also important to do due diligence and read the application form if you are doing the grant on your own.
2. If they say you can qualify, Have a list of pre-qualified candidates so you can screen them quickly before applying for the government grant. It’s important that your new hire can’t start before the grant is approved, so the start date needs to be flexible.
3. Once you’ve identified an eligible candidate, write and submit the grant application.
4. The candidate can start working after the application is approved.
5. Refer to the grant contribution agreement for instructions on how and when to submit pay stubs, reports and other requirements to receive reimbursements. Reporting will come at different times such as half way or the end of the internship.

Companies will get reimbursed after submitting the requested documents at specific times. The Candian government grant may have details about the reimbursement schedule. For example, the Agri-Food Youth Employment Skills Program outlines this reimbursement schedule:

• Reimbursement is issued at the end of the internship for projects that last under 8 months
• 50% reimbursement is given half way through the internship and 50% upon completion for projects that are 8 to 12 months 

How do I apply for a hiring grant?

You have two options: 

1. Let us grant gurus manage the application for you from beginning to end. We will send you a curated list of hiring grants you qualify for and you can choose which funding programs you want to apply for.
2. Sign up for our GetGranted system to be automatically notified about hiring grants you are eligible for and apply to the ones you want. This option is a great solution for small and medium-sized companies who aren’t yet able to use our consulting services.

Conclusion

There are many hiring grants at the national and provincial level in Canada for small and medium-sized companies to take advantage of. Don’t miss out on thousands of dollars or more because Canadian government business grants can end at any time. Many companies lose out on funding because they didn’t apply fast enough and all of the funding was awarded to businesses who applied earlier.
It’s important to make sure that you qualify for the hiring grant before you put an employee on the payroll. You can simply call the program advisor to ask about your chances of qualifying for the government grant. When you are ready to apply, you can use our experienced consultants to manage the full process for you from beginning to end or use our GetGranted system for automatic updates on which hiring grants you qualify for so you can apply for them yourself.