Change Address, Utilities, and Digital Accounts After Divorce in Yukon

Most people focus on the legal milestones — the signed separation agreement, the court order, the Certificate of Divorce. What they underestimate is the sprawling list of accounts, addresses, and digital profiles that still reflect a shared life. Getting this wrong isn't just inconvenient. An account still in your former spouse's name, or a shared subscription with access you forgot to revoke, can create financial liability or privacy exposure long after the divorce is final.

This guide covers every practical life-admin update you need to make after a Yukon divorce: address changes, Canada Post mail forwarding, utility accounts, digital subscriptions, and shared passwords.

When to Start

You can begin many of these updates during the separation period, before the divorce is finalized. You do not need the Certificate of Divorce to redirect your mail or contact Northwestel about separating an internet account. However, changes that involve a legal name update — such as changing your address with the Canada Revenue Agency under your restored birth name — must wait until after the 31-day appeal period has elapsed and you have your Certificate of Divorce in hand.

For the address and utility updates that are purely administrative (no name change required), start as soon as you have a confirmed new address.

Update Your Address With the Canada Revenue Agency

Notifying the CRA of your new address is separate from notifying them of your change in marital status, but both are required and both have deadlines.

For the address update: log in to CRA My Account and change your address immediately. This ensures your tax correspondence, Canada Child Benefit payments, and GST/HST credit cheques reach the right place.

For the marital status change: you must file Form RC65 (Marital Status Change) by the end of the month following the month your divorce took effect. Miss this deadline and your benefit calculations will be wrong — the CRA uses marital status to calculate Adjusted Family Net Income, which directly determines how much Canada Child Benefit and GST/HST credit you receive. Getting this right quickly also ensures you're not overpaid (which creates a repayment obligation) or underpaid (which takes months to correct).

The CRA can be reached at 1-800-959-8281, or you can update everything through CRA My Account online.

Canada Post Mail Forwarding

Set up a mail redirect with Canada Post immediately when you move to a new address. Canada Post's "Address Change" service can forward mail from your old address to your new one for a set period — giving you time to notify all senders without missing anything critical.

Log in to canadapost.ca, select "Mail Redirect," and choose a 4-month or 12-month redirect. The cost is modest and worth every cent during a period when account update letters from banks, government agencies, and insurance companies are arriving simultaneously.

A practical note: if you are concerned about your former spouse accessing mail that arrives at the former shared address — particularly during high-conflict separations — upgrade to the full redirect service rather than relying on the other person to pass along your mail.

Utility Accounts: ATCO Electric, Yukon Energy, Northwestel

Joint utility accounts are one of the most overlooked post-divorce liabilities. If both names remain on an account and payments fall behind, both parties are liable to the service provider regardless of what the separation agreement says about who is responsible for paying.

Contact each provider directly and put the account solely in the name of the person remaining at the address, or close the joint account and open a new sole account:

ATCO Electric Yukon — handles electricity delivery in many Yukon communities. Contact their customer service to transfer the account name or establish a new account.

Yukon Energy — the primary electricity generator and distributor for the territory. If you are the person leaving the property, request formal removal from the account. Do not assume the other party will handle this.

Northwestel — the primary internet and landline provider across the Yukon. Separating internet and home phone accounts from a joint name can take a week or more, so start early. If you are setting up service at a new address, Northwestel operates in many communities beyond Whitehorse.

Home heating oil — if your home used oil delivery, contact the supplier to update the account name and billing address.

Home security — contact your alarm company to remove your former spouse as an authorized contact and change all security codes immediately. This is as much a safety matter as an administrative one.

Change Your Address With Service Canada, Motor Vehicles, and Other Agencies

Beyond the CRA, update your address with the following:

Service Canada — update your address through My Service Canada Account for your Employment Insurance, CPP, and SIN records.

Yukon Motor Vehicles — if you have a new address, your driver's licence address must be updated. Visit the Motor Vehicles office at 300 Main Street, Whitehorse (phone: 867-667-5315). Note that if you are also reverting to your birth name, do both updates at the same visit.

Yukon Health Care Insurance Plan — update your address and, if applicable, your name. Call 867-667-5209 or visit their Whitehorse office. Keeping your health care card information current is essential for uninterrupted territorial coverage.

Canada Post, banks, and financial institutions — update your address directly with each bank, credit union, and investment account. Do not rely on mail forwarding as a permanent fix; notify each institution directly.

If you want a complete Yukon-specific post-divorce checklist that covers all government agencies, financial institutions, and private accounts with exact addresses and processing times, the Yukon After-Divorce Checklist walks through the full sequence.

Digital Accounts and Shared Subscriptions

This is the category most people leave until last — and it is where the most privacy and financial exposure tends to linger.

Passwords and Security Credentials

Change the password and security questions on every account that your former spouse had access to, or could plausibly access:

• Personal email (Gmail, Outlook, iCloud Mail)
• Online banking
• Cloud storage: iCloud, Google Drive, Dropbox
• Social media accounts
• Apple ID and Google Account

This is not about distrust for its own sake. Shared access to email means someone can receive password-reset notifications on your behalf. Shared cloud storage means shared visibility into documents, photos, and location data.

Check your iCloud or Google account settings for any "Family Sharing" or "Shared Albums" that were set up during the marriage and remove the other party's access.

Location Sharing

If you set up location sharing through Apple's "Find My" app, Google Maps sharing, or a family tracking app, disable this immediately. Go into your phone's settings, revoke any location access granted to your former spouse's account, and check whether any shared devices (tablets, spare phones) still have your Apple ID or Google account logged in.

Shared Subscriptions

Joint streaming, software, and subscription accounts need to be separated or cancelled. Common ones to review:

Streaming services — Netflix, Disney+, Amazon Prime, Crave. If the account is in your name and on your credit card, change the password and remove any profiles that belong to your former spouse. If it is in their name, create your own account.

Family phone plan — if you are on a shared mobile plan with a carrier like Bell, Rogers, or Telus, contact the carrier to either split the plan or move your number to a new individual account. This is especially important if your former spouse is the primary account holder, as they retain access to account information and potentially billing details.

Cloud storage plans — Apple One, Google One, and similar family plans share a storage pool. Separate these.

Password managers — if you used a shared password manager like 1Password or LastPass, remove the other user from any shared vaults and rotate the passwords for any credentials they had visibility into.

Software subscriptions — Microsoft 365 Family, Adobe Creative Cloud, and similar family plans need to be split into individual accounts.

Music — Spotify Family, Apple Music Family, YouTube Music Family. Same process: separate into individual subscriptions.

Joint Email Accounts

If you had a shared family email account (common for managing home services, children's school communications, etc.), decide whether to close it or convert it to a sole account. If children are involved and it is used for school communication, you may choose to maintain shared access temporarily with explicit boundaries — or set up separate parent accounts with the school.

A Note on Safety

If your separation involves any concern for your safety, treat address and digital account updates as a privacy matter, not just an administrative one. Use a Post Office box or a trusted third-party address when notifying joint service providers of your new location. Contact the Yukon Family Law Information Centre (FLIC) at 867-456-6721 if you need guidance on accessing safety-related protections during this period.

The Full Post-Divorce Admin Picture

The address, utility, and digital updates in this post are the practical layer of life administration after a Yukon divorce. They sit alongside the more complex legal updates — name changes, pension division, beneficiary changes, property title transfers — that also need to happen in a specific sequence.

The Yukon After-Divorce Checklist covers all of it in one place: government agencies in order, financial institutions, estate planning, and the practical life-admin layer, with exact offices, phone numbers, fees, and processing times specific to the Yukon.

See more Yukon guides →