Deposit railway documents

Railway documents can be deposited with Corporations Canada under sections 104 and 105 of the Canada Transportation Act. Railway documents are submitted to Corporations Canada using the deposit function of the Railway Tool.

Requirements

Documents must be in optical character readable (OCR) PDF.

  • For section 104 – the document must be the full text.
  • For section 105 – the document must be the full text or a summary (also referred to as a memorandum).

There are no requirements concerning the contents of documents. However, before accepting a document, Corporations Canada will review it to ensure that:

  • the document is being deposited under the appropriate section of the CTA
  • the document has been signed by all parties and the name of each person signing appears in print form
  • the effective date of the document is clearly stated in the document; Corporations Canada will not fill in the date if it is left blank
  • for secondary documents, the annexes or collateral listed in the document are the same as those listed in the primary document.

A document that does not meet these requirements will be considered deficient and returned without being deposited.

Note

  • A primary document is the first of a series of documents involved in a transaction or a relationship.
  • A secondary document is a document that is related to the primary document, either because it is part of the same transaction or because it is an amendment, assignment, release or discharge of the primary document.
  • The Railway Tool only allows a single primary document and its related secondary documents to be part of a railway submission. Each primary document requires a separate submission.

Submitting documents for deposit

Step 1 – Sign in

To submit a document, you need to request authorization or sign in. This allows you to search and deposit railway documents.

Step 2 – Submit your railway document

  1. After signing in, use the Railway Tool Dashboard dashboard to either submit or search railway documents
  2. If you choose to submit, confirm the contact name and email address. You can modify this information if you want all correspondence related to this submission to go to a different person or address.

    Indicate whether the submission includes a primary document. If you only intend to deposit a secondary document, indicate the document number of the primary document related to this submission. If you do not know the document number, use the search function of the Railway Tool.
  3. For both primary and secondary documents, you will be asked to enter details about the document:
    • Document title – the name given to the document being deposited
    • Document date – the effective date of the document
    • Legislative reference – the section of the Canada Transportation Act under which the document is being deposited
    • Document parties – list all the parties who have signed or are listed in the document; after adding each name press the Add button until all document parties are added.

    Attach the PDF document to the submission by pressing the Browse button. Remember that only PDF files that are optical character readable (OCR) will be accepted. If your PDF is not OCR, the Railway Tool will not let you continue and will display an error message.
  4. Review your railway submission before proceeding to checkout. If you have another document that is part of this submission, add it. All secondary documents submitted at this stage must relate to the primary document being submitted or indicated.

    Once all secondary documents have been added, the Railway Tool will ask you to confirm the submission before proceeding to checkout.
  5. Checkout and pay the fee. You will receive an acknowledgement, which includes the document title and number.

Documents received

A document is considered to be received at the date and time Corporations Canada receives the document. The Railway Tool will automatically add the date and time when the document is received for deposit.

Documents accepted

Corporations Canada will send a Notice of Acceptance once the document submitted for deposit has been accepted. The notice will include:

  • the date and time the document was deposited
  • the document title and number

Any errors in the contents of the Notice of Acceptance should be immediately brought to the attention of Corporations Canada (see Contact us).

Deficient document

Corporations Canada will not pre-approve or review a document before it is submitted. After receiving and reviewing the document, Corporations Canada will either

  • accept the document for deposit and issue the Notice of Acceptance

or

  • return the document as deficient.

If deficient, Corporations Canada will return the document to you. The document will be issued a new submission date and time once it is resubmitted and will receive a deposit date when approved. All Corporations Canada decisions in this regard are final.