Economical Invoicing and Billing Support for Canadian Businesses

File a T1 return for the year, sending it electronically with CRA-certified software or mailing a paper return. Gather your slips and receipts first and check them against the ones listed in My Account. For the 2025 tax year the filing and payment deadline was 30 April 2026, or 15 June 2026 to file if you or your spouse were self-employed, with payment still due 30 April 2026. CRA online filing for 2025 returns closes 29 January 2027.

Canadian income tax is built up in layers. You total your income for the year, subtract the deductions you qualify for to arrive at taxable income, then apply the federal brackets and your province's brackets to that figure. Each bracket rate applies only to the income sitting inside it, so earning more never retaxes the dollars below. Non-refundable credits, starting with the basic personal amount, come off the tax afterwards. Look up the CRA bracket table for the tax year you are filing.

There is no fixed percentage. Your employer withholds federal income tax, where 2026 brackets start at 14%, plus provincial tax, CPP at 5.95% on earnings between the $3,500 exemption and the $74,600 ceiling, and EI at $1.63 per $100 of insurable earnings up to $68,900. Credits claimed on your TD1 reduce the income tax part. Higher earners also pay CPP2 at 4% on earnings between the ceiling and $85,000 for 2026.

Not on a Canadian personal return. Net income there is total income minus deductions such as RRSP contributions and union dues, worked out before any tax is applied, and it is the figure used to test income-tested benefits and credits. In everyday payroll language, net pay does mean what reaches your account after tax and other withholdings. For a corporation it depends on the statement: accounting net income is normally after tax, while the return starts from income before tax.

The CRA mails an income tax package to people who filed on paper the year before, usually in February. Anyone else can order one online or by phone, or download and print the forms. Filing online is faster: a refund on an electronically filed return usually arrives in about two weeks. Slips such as T4 and T5 come from your employer or financial institution, not from the CRA, though filed copies show in CRA My Account.

Payments for hosting a student are taxable where they exceed what you spend on that student's room, meals and utilities and the arrangement is run for profit. Where the fee only covers your costs, the CRA generally treats it as cost recovery with nothing to report and nothing to deduct. Keep a record of the fee and of what you spent, because the answer turns on those figures rather than on the label homestay.

Child care paid so you could work, run a business or study is generally deductible, and it normally has to be claimed by the lower-income spouse. Eligible costs include daycare, a nanny, day camps and some overnight camp or boarding school fees. The amount is capped per child by the child's age and by a share of earned income; the current limits are on the CRA's child care expenses page. Keep receipts showing the provider's name and, for an individual caregiver, their SIN.

Yes. Tips are income whether they come as cash, on a card, or out of a pooling arrangement, and they are reportable even when no slip shows them. Controlled tips that run through the employer appear on your T4 with tax, CPP and EI already withheld. Direct and pooled cash tips are not withheld on, so you add them to your return yourself and may owe a balance. Keep a daily log and set money aside.

From 1 October 2026, British Columbia applies 7% PST to several services that were previously untaxed: accounting and bookkeeping, architectural, engineering and geoscience, security and private investigation, and non-residential real estate services. Architectural, engineering and geoscience fees are taxed on 30% of the purchase price rather than the full amount. Providers not already collecting PST must register online, and can do so up to six months before their first taxable sale.

Canada has no gift tax, so moving money to a spouse is not a taxable event in itself. The catch is the attribution rules: income and capital gains earned on cash or property you gift to your spouse are generally taxed back to you rather than to them. Two routes sidestep that, giving your spouse money to contribute to their own TFSA, and a documented loan at the prescribed rate with the interest genuinely paid each year.

Property tax on the home you live in is not deductible. It becomes deductible only where the property earns income or supports a business: a landlord deducts it against rental income, and a self-employed person with a qualifying work space at home deducts the portion tied to that space, while a salaried employee working from home cannot claim property tax at all and only an employee paid by commission can. Tax on vacant investment land is often added to the land's cost instead. Keep the municipal bills.

Land transfer tax is a tax the buyer pays on closing when title changes hands, levied by most provinces — Alberta and Saskatchewan instead charge land title registration fees, and in Nova Scotia the deed transfer tax is set municipally. Where a province does levy it, the scale is usually graduated and applied to the purchase price, so a higher price attracts a higher effective rate. Some municipalities charge a second land transfer tax of their own, and several provinces, including Ontario and British Columbia, offer first-time buyer relief, as does the City of Toronto on its own municipal tax. Your lawyer collects and remits it at closing, so check your province's current schedule before you budget.