VRSP (Voluntary Retirement Savings Plan)
Régime volontaire d'épargne-retraite (RVER) in French
Quick definition
The Voluntary Retirement Savings Plan (VRSP) is Québec's automatic workplace savings plan. Employers with 10 or more eligible employees and no other retirement plan with payroll deduction must offer one; workers are enrolled automatically but can opt out.
Why the VRSP exists
Québec created the VRSP so that every worker in the province would have access to a retirement plan through payroll, not just employees of large companies with pension plans. Small employers rarely set up pensions on their own, so the province flipped the default: if a business offers nothing else, it must at least offer a VRSP, a low-cost pooled plan run by an outside administrator rather than by the employer.
The VRSP is Québec's version of the federal PRPP framework, with one big difference: in Québec, offering the plan is mandatory for covered employers, while the federal PRPP is voluntary everywhere it applies.
Which employers must offer one
The obligation applies to Québec employers that have 10 or more eligible employees, meaning workers aged 18 or over with one year of uninterrupted service, and that offer no other retirement savings vehicle with payroll deduction, such as an RRSP or TFSA with deduction at source, or a pension plan (as of July 2026). Employers who already offer one of those are exempt.
The law contemplates extending the obligation to employers with 5 or more eligible employees, but that extension takes effect only on a date to be set by the government, which had not been fixed as of July 2026.
How enrolment and contributions work
Covered employees are enrolled automatically and can opt out within a set window after enrolment, or later set their contribution rate to 0%. Inertia does the heavy lifting: doing nothing means saving.
The default employee contribution rate is set by regulation and escalates by law over time; it currently sits at around 4% of gross salary (as of July 2026). Employees can choose a different rate, higher or lower, at any time within the plan's rules.
Employer contributions are optional. When an employer does contribute, those amounts are not a taxable benefit to the employee, and they vest to the employee. Employee contributions are deducted from pay before tax, so the tax relief arrives immediately on each paycheque rather than as a refund.
Tax treatment and RRSP room
VRSP contributions live inside the RRSP system: your contributions are deductible like RRSP contributions, and both your contributions and your employer's count against your RRSP contribution room. If you contribute heavily to a personal RRSP as well, track the combined total against your limit.
Fees, oversight, and access to the money
VRSPs are managed as large pooled funds by authorized administrators, insurers and fund managers licensed for the purpose, with fees capped at low levels by design. The plans operate under the oversight of Retraite Québec and the Autorité des marchés financiers (AMF). The investment structure resembles a defined contribution pension: your outcome depends on contributions and investment returns, with a default lifecycle option for members who make no choice.
Access differs by source. Employer contributions are generally locked in until age 55, like pension money, while your own employee contributions remain accessible under the plan's rules, though withdrawing retirement savings early defeats the purpose. Exact conditions depend on the plan, so check yours before counting on the money.
In Canada
The VRSP is a Québec-only creature, in force since 2014, and it is the only place in Canada where offering a workplace savings plan is compulsory for small private-sector employers. The rest of the country has the voluntary PRPP framework instead, which has seen far less uptake. For workers, the practical effect is that even a five-person Québec shop above the threshold must put a payroll savings vehicle on the table, something no other province requires (as of July 2026).
Worked example
Camille, 28, joins a 15-person Montréal design studio that offers no pension or group RRSP, so the studio must offer a VRSP. After a year of service she is enrolled automatically at the default rate of around 4% of her $52,000 salary (as of July 2026), about $2,080 a year, deducted from pay before tax.
Her employer chooses not to contribute, which is allowed. Camille could opt out, but she leaves the deduction in place: her paycheques shrink by less than the contribution because the tax relief is immediate, and the contributions use up a matching amount of her RRSP room each year.
Related terms
Reviewed by Alexandre Bernier, CFP®, CIM®, PFP®·Updated July 2026