Bonus, overtime and commission share the same underlying problem: none of them is a fixed, contractual amount, so none of them can be assumed to repeat at exactly last year's level. All three also show up folded into Box 14 of a T4 rather than broken out separately — employment commissions get their own reference code, Box 42, but the amount is already included in the Box 14 total, not added on top of it.
The common approach is a two-year average, drawn from T4s and Notices of Assessment, rather than relying on the most recent year alone. Some programs go further and use the lower of the two years if the trend is declining, on the theory that a shrinking bonus or commission pattern is more likely to continue shrinking than to bounce back. Treat the specific method as something to confirm with the lender or program rather than a fixed universal rule — the underlying logic (don't trust one good year) is what's consistent, not the exact formula.
Beyond the T4/NOA history, an employer letter confirming that the bonus, overtime, or commission structure has been in place for a meaningful period and is expected to continue adds real weight — it turns "this happened before" into "this is a real, ongoing part of the compensation structure," which is the actual question an underwriter is trying to answer.
This module covers commission earned as a T4 employee — someone on an employer's payroll whose pay includes a commission component. A commissioned salesperson operating as a self-employed individual, filing a T2125 rather than receiving a T4, is a materially different file with different documentation, covered fully in Course 03, Self-Employed & Incorporated Borrowers. The two are easy to confuse on the surface — "I work in sales" — and the first question worth asking is simply which slip they receive.
A sudden spike in the most recent year with no explanation, no employer letter confirming the pay structure, or a commission arrangement paid by a business the borrower or a close family member owns (which shifts the file toward Module 07's family-business treatment) are all reasons to slow down and ask more questions before building qualifying income around the number.
A borrower's T4s show commission income of $18,000 two years ago, $22,000 last year, and a pay stub projecting roughly $41,000 this year after landing one very large deal. How should this be documented?
The completed two-year history is the only settled data — the current year is still a projection built on one large deal, which is exactly the kind of one-off event that shouldn't be assumed to repeat without support. Using the $41,000 projection is the tempting error because it looks like the client's real, current capability, but a single strong deal is not a pattern yet. Ignoring commission entirely overcorrects — if the structure is genuine and ongoing, some of it is real qualifying income; the job is to document it properly, not discard it.
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