u/canadave_nyc

question about pension payments pre-65 and post-65

Hi, I have a pension that will be starting this year when I'm 55. It is indexed to inflation 60%. In the Tax and Benefits section, for the pre-65 amount in today's dollars, I entered the annual pension amount I will start with. Where it asks for the annual post-65 pension amount in today's dollars, I should just put the same amount as I put for the pre-65 pension amount, right? i.e. I don't adjust the post-65 amount to reflect what my pre-65 pension amount is in today's dollars multiplied by 10 years multiplied by the 60% increase each year?

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u/canadave_nyc — 3 days ago

how to reflect mid-year LIRA unlocking in Projection section?

At the start of this year, my wife (turning 65 years old this year) had a LIRA. A couple months ago, she unlocked it, converted it to a LIF, and transferred 50% in-kind to her RRSP. She also created a RRIF, and did a partial transfer of a small amount of investments to it from her RRSP. I would imagine this affects the projections going forward (the LIF is now half as big, the RRIF now allows income from that to be tax-split with me, etc); how do we put this into the plan properly now, so we can see the effects on our plan, rather than waiting for next year to update the Discovery inputs?

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u/canadave_nyc — 5 days ago

questions about having to pay CRA quarterly installments

Hi, my wife and I are newly retired (April 2026). I'm handling the financial planning end of things.

My understanding is that the CRA makes you pay quarterly installments if your tax owing is more than $3,000 in the current year and either of the previous two years. I've read a lot about people trying to avoid having to pay these quarterly installments, and I guess I have a couple of questions.

First, what is the point of avoiding CRA installments (presumably to keep money earning interest/gains longer) if avoiding the installments involves having appropriate deductions taken off at source anyway? Isn't it six of one, half-dozen of the other? Same same?

Second--is there a good resource anyone can recommend that explains simply and in detail where/how to calculate tax owing, walks through the process, what to do if you find you're above $3,000 and you want to avoid CRA installments, etc?

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u/canadave_nyc — 6 days ago

trying to understand decumulation order

Hi there, I'm just looking at my plan again and trying to understand something.

I have the "Registered, Non-Registered, Tax-free" decumulation AI strategy enabled. However, looking at the Projection bar graph, it looks like I first go through all my non-registered, then all my tax-free, then the registered handles the remaining years' income. I'm trying to understand why that is. Thanks!

https://public.adviice.com/dashboard/24h-b6XGheHlzI8x

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u/canadave_nyc — 7 days ago

any Firefox users have tips to prevent having to reenter 2FA every time?

When I go to log into WS on desktop using Firefox (Mac), it has a "Trust this browser for 30 days" checkbox. But it appears to do absolutely nothing. I check it, log in, and then next time I go to log in, it runs me through 2FA again.

Any Firefox users able to get that checkbox to be effective?

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u/canadave_nyc — 7 days ago

Suggestion for update

Hi, let me just say right off the bat that this suggestion was born out of me being a little stupid. But since we can all be a little stupid sometimes, I think there's a spot in the platform that could maybe use a slight update to prevent some other poor soul from duplicating my mistake.

In the Expenses snapshots, I entered my mortgage amount per month in the appropriate spot at the bottom of the page (I'm using Simple view). Above that, I saw the field labelled "Total Expenses", and my brain translated that as the place where I should enter the total of all my expenses, including the mortgage.

Now, yes, you could argue that since that field is in the Monthly "Personal" Expenses section, and since there's a separate "Total Annual Expense" number at the top, maybe I should've put 2 and 2 together and realized it shouldn't include the mortgage expense. But there's a lot of numbers on that page and various sections containing various expenses; so perhaps I can suggest that it might be better to label that field as "Personal Expenses" rather than "Total Expenses". It might also not hurt to add some wording to the explanatory text accompanying that field, emphasizing that this is NOT to include any expenses already listed in the other section.

Happily, me realizing all this and adjusting the numbers accordingly resulted in my success rate going from 77% to 100%, so that's terrific :) But it did make me do a facepalm when I realized what I'd done ;)

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u/canadave_nyc — 9 days ago

I had a Masterchef 4-burner natural gas BBQ from Canadian Tire that I bought a few years ago. It was great--once the thermometer showed 400 degrees (about a 10 minute preheat), I could make skinless chicken breasts on it, 4 minutes a side, and it could come out nice and cooked, lightly "browned" on the outside. Good sear marks.

That BBQ finally gave up the ghost, so I just replaced it with a theoretical "upgrade"--a Napoleon 525 Rogue XT from Costco. On this one, the thermometer tops out at around 600 degrees or so--I verified it by sticking an oven thermometer on the grill grids. So you'd think I could really char these chicken breasts that I was lightly browning at 400 degrees on my previous BBQ.

However, that's not the case. There's good sear marks from the grill grids, but there's not a lot of browning going on with the outer part of the chicken breast. And it doesn't seem to cook as well as the previous Masterchef BBQ--I really have to give it the full 4 minutes a side, sometimes a bit more, just to get it well-cooked. I thought it might be a hot/cold spot issue, but it seems the same no matter where on the grill grids I cook the chicken.

I'm struggling to understand why the performance of this Napoleon is so-so compared to my previous BBQ, especially since I verified that the temp is indeed hotter. The only differences I can think of in terms of setup is that the Masterchef had stainless steel grids, while the Napoleon has porcelain cast-iron I believe; also, I'm using the hose that came with the Napoleon for the natural gas hookup, rather than the hose I was using with my Masterchef. But I don't see why the hose would make a difference, particularly since the temp seems to be fine at the grids.

Any ideas? I'm stumped. The same issue occurs when I cook burgers on it. The Napoleon just doesn't seem to cook as well, even with all burners lit (I always cook with all burners lit, just like on the Masterchef).

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u/canadave_nyc — 14 days ago

For those who check your mailbox once a week, make sure to grab your Canada census envelope and get cracking on the census questionnaire. It was mailed out May 4 and you have until May 12 to complete the questionnaire.

It's vital to fill out the census to ensure St. Albert gets all the federal funding it can get (which in turn benefits you).

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u/canadave_nyc — 16 days ago

I'm coming from a cheapo 4-burner natural gas Masterchef BBQ from Canadian Tire, purchased about 8 years ago. To make boneless/skinless chicken breasts in that BBQ, I would preheat until the BBQ thermometer read 400, then cook the chicken for 4 minutes per side. Always came out tender inside, nicely cooked outside.

Got a new 4-burner natural gas Rogue 525 XT, did the 30-minute bake off initialization step, and was immediately struck by how fast the Napoleon reached not just 400 degrees, but even 600, then 700, on the thermometer. Encouraged at this, I tried making my chicken breasts in the same way as my Masterchef. The results were horrible. Not very cooked, not soft and tender and juicy. And the outside looked pale, not lightly browned like chicken should.

So instead of 400, I let the BBQ get to 600 the next day and tried again. The results were slightly better, but still pale outside, and while more thoroughly cooked inside, the chicken still didn't have that nice tender/soft melt-in-your-mouth feel to it.

So I'm stumped. Is this normal for Napoleon grills? Is it possible the thermometer is way off? I'm just lost as to what to try here.

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u/canadave_nyc — 24 days ago