Employment Insurance Coverage Survey (EICS)

Detailed information for 2025

The Employment Insurance Coverage Survey provides a meaningful picture of who does or does not have access to EI benefits among the jobless and those in a situation of underemployment. The survey also covers access to maternity and parental benefits.

Data release - October 27, 2026

• Questionnaire(s) and reporting guide(s)
• Description
• Data sources and methodology
• Data accuracy

Description

The Employment Insurance Coverage Survey (EICS) was conducted by Statistics Canada with the cooperation and support of Employment and Social Development Canada.

The primary objective of this survey is to examine the coverage of the Employment Insurance (EI) program. It provides a comprehensive picture of who has access to EI benefits-and who is excluded- among the unemployed and underemployed. Additionally, the survey covers access to maternity and parental benefits.

The survey was designed to generate metrics on program coverage, accessibility and eligibility, while identifying groups with a lower probability of receiving benefits. These include the long-term unemployed, labour market entrants, students, workers leaving uninsured jobs, individuals who quit their job voluntarily, and those who qualify based on their employment history but ultimately do not claim or receive benefits. Additionally, the survey provides a detailed breakdown of respondents' most recent job characteristics and their specific reasons for not claiming or receiving benefits.

The EICS data enables analysts to examine the characteristics of people who lack EI coverage or have exhausted their benefits, as well as their job search intensity, expectations of recall, and alternative sources of income and financial support.

Survey data on maternity and parental benefits provide information on the proportion of parents who received benefits following the birth of a child, the reasons some did not receive benefits, and how parental benefits are shared between spouses. The survey also examines return-to-work patterns and circumstances, the adequacy of household income among families with young children, and related trends.

In 2020, the survey was redesigned to reflect changes to the EI maternity and parental benefits program. Specifically, the target population of parents was expanded from mothers of infants aged one year or under to parents of infants up to 18 months old. This adjustment ensured the inclusion of fathers in single-father or same-sex households, as well as couples who opted for extended parental benefits. Additionally, in 2020, the April-May collection cycle was delayed to September-October as a result of COVID-19 shutdowns.

In 2025, the integration of a dynamic roster for the benefits section made it possible to record information by the different types of benefits claimed by the respondent in the last two years. This feature documents the duration of benefits, the activities carried out by respondents during that time, and the reasons for claim denials, facilitating direct comparisons between regular and special benefit claimants.

Due to these methodological changes, users should exercise caution when comparing recent data with results from previous survey years.

Reference period: Calendar year

Collection period: There are 4 collection cycles each year: April-May, July-August, November-December and January-February. Each cycle lasts 5 weeks and begins during the month following the reference month.

Subjects

• Employment insurance, social assistance and other transfers
• Labour
• Non-wage benefits

Data sources and methodology

Target population

The target population for this survey is composed of unemployed individuals (as defined by the Labour Force Survey) and other individuals who, given their recent status in the labour market, could potentially be eligible for Employment Insurance. This population is divided into five types:
1) persons who were unemployed during the reference week;
2) persons employed part-time during the reference week;
3) persons not in the labour force during the reference week;
4) persons employed full-time during the reference week who started their current job during the previous two months
5) parents of infants aged 18 months or less working during the reference week.

Since 2020, the target population has included parents of children aged 18 months or younger, allowing for the inclusion of single fathers and fathers in same-sex couples, as well as couples who opted for extended parental benefits.

The EICS target population is a subset of the target population for the Labour Force Survey (LFS). Specifically excluded from the LFS coverage are residents of the Yukon, Northwest Territories and Nunavut; persons living on Indian Reserves; full-time members of the Canadian Armed Forces; and inmates of institutions. Together, these exclusions represent approximately 2% of the population aged 15 or over.

Instrument design

The questionnaire developed jointly by Statistics Canada and Employment and Social Development Canada was tested in a Pilot Survey before its implementation in 1997. Experts from the Questionnaire Design Resource Centre used cognitive interviews and prepared an evaluation report. The main recommendations were implemented. Minor changes were incorporated over the years, either to correct application errors, broaden the target population for some questions or to implement wording changes recommended by interviewers. Several questions were incorporated in 2000 to collect comprehensive information on access and use of parental leave.

The questionnaire underwent a major redesign for 2004 collection. The main purpose of the redesign was to bring the computer application in line with current standards for structure, naming conventions and operational considerations. There was little change to the wording of questions themselves, in particular for items used to derive the key survey estimates for the unemployed. For mothers however, content was added or modified in response to data gaps and issues identified by survey analysts. The new application was thoroughly tested for compliance with the written specifications.

In 2006, a few questions were modified to reflect the change in jurisdiction of parental benefits in the province of Québec. Additionally, all questions specifically related to parental benefits are now contained in two new sections: Parental benefits for mothers (PM) and Parental benefits for fathers (PF). These new sections replace Parental benefits (PB) and Total benefits (TB) used for 2004 and 2005 collection. The sections on Employment insurance (EI) Additional Payments (AP) and Plans to return to work (PR) were modified slightly for mothers but unchanged for the majority of respondents.

In 2020, the questionnaire again underwent a major redesign to reflect changes in the Employment Insurance program and to bring the questionnaire application in line with current standards for structure, naming conventions and operational considerations, such as self-response. The updated questionnaire, developed jointly by Statistics Canada and Employment and Social Development Canada, was tested by experts from the Questionnaire Design Resource Centre, using cognitive interviews. Major changes to the survey questionnaire include the addition of new sections: Confirm Parent Status (PA), Parental benefits for spouses (PS), Benefits (BE) and Labour Market Activities (LMAM). These new sections replace the sections: Confirm Mother Status (MO), Parental benefits for fathers (PF), Parental benefits for mothers (PM) and Employment insurance (EI). The section on Socio-demographics (SD) was also removed, as similar information is collected by the Labour Force Survey. In addition, the section Stopped Working (SW) was not included for the 2020 reference year.

The questionnaire was enhanced starting for the EICS 2025 to improve data accuracy regarding regular and special benefits. The Benefits (BE) module now includes a dynamic roster for each benefit type claimed over the past two years. This allows for the tracking of payment durations, participation in work, study programs, or training, as well as specific reasons for claiming denials or non-receipt for both regular and special benefits.

Sampling

This is a sample survey with a cross-sectional design.

The EICS is administered to a sub-sample of individuals in the LFS, and its sample design is closely linked. EICS generally uses the rotation groups that completed their six-month participation in the LFS cycles of March, June, October or December. The sample of parents is selected from four additional LFS rotation groups to ensure an adequate sample size. The LFS sample is further stratified using the five EICS types which are mentioned in the Target population section above.
A small number of records are excluded prior to sample selection: respondents with invalid names, phone numbers or employer names; imputed LFS records, and respondents aged 70 and older.

Among the remaining in-scope records, all the available LFS sample is kept. To reduce the response burden within households, a maximum of two persons per household are selected, except in cases where three selected members are all unemployed (the limit is raised to three).

For Type 4 respondents (full-time employed with short job tenure), only those who experienced a work interruption in the two months prior to the survey reference week need to be interviewed. Because this information is not captured during the LFS interview, all full-time workers who have recently started a new job are initially selected. The work interruption question is then asked at the top of the EICS interview; respondents who worked continuously over the two previous months are deemed out-of-scope and receive no further questions.

Note that for EICS 2020, due to program modifications during the COVID-19 pandemic, sampling was restricted only to parents of infants aged 18 months or less for that specific cycle.

Data sources

Data collection for this reference period: 2025-04-22 to 2026-02-20

Responding to this survey is voluntary.

Data are collected directly from survey respondents.

Household members selected for the EICS are contacted within seven weeks of their final LFS interview.

Prior to 2020, all interviews were conducted by telephone, with responses captured directly by interviewers using a computerized questionnaire. Starting in 2020, respondents have been given the option to complete the survey either online or by telephone with the assistance of an interviewer.

Proxy response is not allowed in the EICS. Although a household may have more than one selected respondent, the limit is capped at a maximum of three persons per household.

Similar to the LFS, interviewers make all reasonable efforts to complete the EICS interview, and initial refusals are followed up by a senior interviewer. The survey is available in both English and French, and the average time required to complete the survey is about 17 minutes.

View the Questionnaire(s) and reporting guide(s) .

Error detection

Data editing occurs at multiple stages during processing to ensure data quality and internal consistency.

Initial editing takes place online at the time of the interview. When entered information falls outside expected value ranges or conflicts with previous entries, the system prompts the respondent or interviewer to confirm or correct their response.

Post-collection processing primarily addresses questionnaire flow errors - such as instances where inapplicable questions contain answers or, conversely, where relevant questions were missed. A computerized edit automatically eliminates superfluous data by assigning Valid Skip codes (6, 96, 996 ...) to all questions that fall outside the valid path based on prior answers.

Additionally, reserved 'Not stated' codes (9, 99, 999...) are used to identify missing data attributable to respondents who were unable to answer the preceding filter questions.

To preserve raw data integrity, minimal editing is performed on individual questionnaire items. Consequently, analysts may encounter minor internal consistency errors or outliers during data analysis. A notable example involves the hourly earnings variable (HRLYEARN), which may include a small number of outliers and internal inconsistencies, such as employed individuals reporting zero earnings.

Imputation

Not applicable.

Estimation

The calculation of the weights for the EICS incorporates the individual weights calculated for the LFS, alongside specific survey-level adjustments to account for special features of the EICS design.

To begin, the LFS individual weights are multiplied by 6 to account for the use of one-in-six rotation groups per collection cycle (for parents, the LFS weight is multiplied by 3, reflecting the use of two rotation groups). Further adjustments are then applied to account for EICS sub-sampling within specific strata, as well as for non-response, taking into consideration geography, the five types of EICS respondents and gender.

A final adjustment is done using two independent, non-overlapping external sources:
1. Administrative counts for regular beneficiaries with and without earnings (grouped by administrative regions); and
2. LFS estimates are produced for each respondent group: unemployed individuals, part-time workers, individuals not in the labour force who have worked within the past two years, and eligible full-time workers. Parents who do not belong to one of these four groups are excluded from the LFS characteristic calibration adjustment.

This calibration process ensures that estimates produced using EICS data align with summary counts from external sources.

Bootstrap weights are generated and provided with the dataset to facilitate the accurate calculation of sampling variance for specific estimates.

Quality evaluation

The data were mainly evaluated against recent historical trends, focusing on the derived variables that are created to provide comparable historical data with earlier years of the survey.

Disclosure control

Statistics Canada is prohibited by law from releasing any data which would divulge information obtained under the Statistics Act that relates to any identifiable person, business or organization without the prior knowledge or the consent, in writing, of that person, business or organization. Various confidentiality rules are applied to all data that are released or published to prevent the publication or disclosure of any information deemed confidential. If necessary, data are suppressed to prevent direct or residual disclosure of identifiable data.

Please note that the "Public Use" Microdata Files (PUMF) may differ from the Statistics Canada internal survey "master" files. These discrepancies are intentional measures designed to protect the anonymity of individual survey respondents. Common confidentiality treatments include the suppression of data items, aggregation of specific values into wider categories, converting high-risk identifying values from the master file into a "not stated" designation or perturbation to a different value on the PUMF.

Revisions and seasonal adjustment

This methodology does not apply to this survey.

Data accuracy

While considerable effort is made to ensure high standards throughout all stages of collection and processing, the resulting estimates are inevitably subject to a certain degree of error. These errors can be broken down into two major types: non-sampling and sampling.

The basis for measuring the potential size of sampling errors is the standard error of the estimates derived from survey results. Because of the large variety of estimates that can be produced from a survey, the standard error of an estimate is usually expressed relative to the estimate to which it pertains. This resulting measure, known as the coefficient of variation (CV) of an estimate, is obtained by dividing the standard error of the estimate by the estimate itself and is expressed as a percentage of the estimate.

• Additional documentation