How Do I File a CNESST Claim?

Checklist of the five steps to file a CNESST worker's claim in Quebec

You report the injury to your employer, see a health professional for an attestation médicale, then send the Réclamation du travailleur to CNESST, online through MonEspace CNESST or by mail, within six months of the accident.

What has to happen before you submit the form?

Tell your employer about the accident as soon as you can. Then see a health professional. The first health professional who treats you fills out the attestation médicale, which states the diagnosis and an expected date of recovery. You need that certificate before you file, because it goes to CNESST with your claim as proof of the injury.

If you are off work fewer than fourteen full days and are not asking to be reimbursed for anything, you do not need to file the Réclamation du travailleur at all.

What do you actually send, and where does it go?

The form is called the Réclamation du travailleur. CNESST accepts it two ways: filled out online through MonEspace CNESST, or downloaded and mailed in. The same form is also how you claim reimbursement for medical costs, travel or damaged equipment like an orthesis or a prosthesis, not only lost wages.

The order, start to finish:

  • Report the accident to your employer
  • See a health professional and get the attestation médicale
  • Fill out the Réclamation du travailleur, online or on paper
  • Send the attestation médicale along with it
  • Wait for CNESST to open your file and assign a file number

How long do you have to file?

Six months from the date of the accident. For an occupational disease, the six months runs from the day the diagnosis, or the probable link between the diagnosis and your work, was made known to you. Quebec CNESST Claim Deadlines covers what happens if you are close to that date or think you have already missed it, and the separate deadlines that apply if a decision gets contested.

What happens after CNESST has your claim?

CNESST opens a file and assigns you a file number once your Réclamation du travailleur arrives. From there it reviews the file to decide whether the claim is admissible. CNESST does not give a fixed timeframe for that review, because it depends on what each file contains, which is exactly why the appointments, the dates and the paperwork in between matter as much as the form itself.

That is the gap most people fall into. The claim gets filed, then months pass with appointments, missed shifts and letters from CNESST and none of it is in one place when someone finally asks for it.

The Quebec Workplace Injury Companion Guide is built around the CNESST process specifically, and it is designed to sit alongside the National Workplace Injury Recovery Guide, which covers the appointments and symptom tracking that apply no matter where you were hurt in Canada. Together they give you the CNESST-specific pages and the day to day recovery record in one place.

National Workplace Injury Recovery Guide

If your recovery were reviewed tomorrow, what would your record say?

The National Workplace Injury Recovery Guide is where your recovery gets documented, day by day. Symptoms, appointments, calls and costs, written while they are fresh. It works in every province and it stands on its own.

Both guides, $49. Add the Quebec Workplace Injury Companion Guide for the dates and rules that shape your recovery in Quebec, and the discount applies at checkout. Normally $63.99.

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Last verified: September 2026.