Saskatchewan Financial Help for Relatives Raising a Child

The Money Exists. The Problem Is Finding It Before It Goes to the Wrong Account.

A child has moved into your home — maybe overnight, maybe after weeks of worry — and your pension is now covering groceries, school supplies, winter clothes, and childcare for two. Saskatchewan has monthly payments, federal tax credits, and employment supplements earmarked for this child. But the money sits across two levels of government, and which payments you can actually claim depends on whether your arrangement is informal care, a court-ordered Person of Sufficient Interest placement, or a parenting order under The Children's Law Act, 2020.

The Ministry of Social Services explains the PSI programme on one page but doesn't mention the CRA. The CRA explains Form RC66 but doesn't know your provincial options. Saskatchewan Income Support handles basic benefits but won't tell you about the Saskatchewan Employment Incentive if you're working part-time. Meanwhile, the Canada Child Benefit may still be flowing to the biological parent's bank account every month — even though the child eats breakfast at your table.

The Arrangement Alignment System inside this guide starts with your actual situation — not a programme name — and maps it to every payment, allowance, and tax credit the child qualifies for. You answer four questions about your care arrangement, and the guide tells you which chapters, forms, and agencies apply to you. No wrong applications. No wasted calls to the wrong office.

What's Inside

A 43-page guide covering every financial support available to grandparents and relatives raising a child in Saskatchewan, with application instructions for each one:

• Care Arrangement Decision Tool — answer four questions to determine your care track (informal care, PSI order, or King's Bench parenting order) and skip straight to the chapters that apply to you
• Person of Sufficient Interest walkthrough — the PSI programme under The Child and Family Services Act, how it gives you legal custody as a non-ward placement, what Extended Family Maintenance pays, the SFFA payment calendar, and the Ministry's PSI Action Plan improvements since the 2023 Advocate investigation
• Canada Child Benefit transfer — how to complete CRA Form RC66 step by step, with the evidence checklist the CRA accepts when a biological parent won't sign the transfer, and how a PSI court order strengthens your claim
• Saskatchewan Income Support — the Adult Basic Benefit ($365 outside the Northern Administration District), Children's Basic Benefit ($65 per child), Shelter Benefit caps by city and family size, and how SIS interacts with other benefits
• Saskatchewan Employment Incentive — up to $400 for one child, $500 for two, $600 for three or more, with the $500 minimum-earnings threshold, the $2,200 phase-out start, and the earned-income caps where the benefit reaches zero
• Court of King's Bench parenting order — the $300 filing fee, the forms, the best-interests-of-the-child standard under Section 10, and how a parenting order changes your benefit picture compared with a PSI order
• CPP Children's Benefit — what the child receives when a parent has died or is disabled, how to apply, and three worked examples showing the calculation
• Jordan's Principle — how First Nations children can access services regardless of which government is responsible, what a Jordan's Principle request covers, and how it interacts with provincial benefits
• Active Families Benefit and disability supports — up to $300 per child per year ($400 if DTC-eligible), the Child Disability Benefit, the Disability Tax Credit T2201 process, and the Saskatchewan Active Families DTC top-up
• Childcare subsidies — income-tested child care subsidy eligibility, how a PSI order or CCB receipt changes what you qualify for, and where to apply
• Appeals and reviews — how to request a review when you're denied or underpaid, with an escalation letter template you can fill in and send

Plus printable standalone worksheets: a care arrangement decision tool, a CRA benefit transfer checklist, a document gathering checklist, a benefit tracking worksheet, an application tracking log, an SEI calculator worksheet, and a contacts directory with every agency phone number and office address referenced in the guide.

Who This Is For

• Grandparents on a fixed income who are covering a grandchild's daily costs out of CPP, OAS, GIS, or the Saskatchewan Seniors Income Plan and did not budget for a child
• Aunts, uncles, older siblings, and family friends who took in a child with little notice and need to know which payments apply before the next school bill is due
• Informal caregivers who have not contacted the Ministry of Social Services and don't know what they can claim without a court order or a ministry file
• Persons of Sufficient Interest who have a PSI court order and want to check whether Extended Family Maintenance, the SEI, or other PSI-specific benefits apply
• Relatives considering a court order — whether PSI or a King's Bench parenting order — who want to understand the financial consequences of each route before committing
• Family members helping from a distance — an adult child, a sibling, or a community worker researching benefits on behalf of the grandparent who is doing the day-to-day caregiving

Why Not Just Use the Free Government Pages?

The Saskatchewan government publishes programme details across dozens of pages on saskatchewan.ca. The CRA publishes Form RC66 instructions in federal-government language. PLEA and the Family Law Information Centre publish overviews of court procedures. The Saskatchewan Foster Families Association publishes the PSI payment calendar. Every one of these resources is valuable, and the guide includes their contact details and phone numbers.

What none of them does is start from your care arrangement, walk you through the specific benefits you qualify for in order, tell you which agency handles each one, give you a checklist of documents to gather before your first call, explain what to do when one programme's payment affects another, and hand you a tracking log so you can record every call and every reference number in one place.

A family lawyer in Saskatoon or Regina charges $250 to $500 an hour. This guide costs — and it's focused on the financial navigation a lawyer doesn't cover: not court filings, but the monthly payments, tax credits, and allowances the child is entitled to.

Full Refund, No Time Limit

If the guide isn't what you expected, email [email protected] and you'll get a full refund. No time limit, no questions.

Get Started

Download the free Saskatchewan Kinship Money Checklist — a one-page summary of the payments available and which agency runs each one. If you want the full application instructions, worksheets, and the Arrangement Alignment System, get the complete guide for .