Economical Merchant Account Reconciliation for Canadian Businesses

Yes. GST/HST you charge customers is collected on the government's behalf, so it sits as a liability until you remit it. Input tax credits on your purchases reduce that balance, and the net amount is what the GST/HST return reports. Record the tax in its own account at the point of sale; treating collected tax as revenue overstates sales and hides what you owe. Reconcile the account every filing period against the return.

No. QST is a separate Quebec tax administered by Revenu Quebec, and it cannot be recovered on your federal GST/HST return. Only a business registered for QST can claim input tax refunds for the 9.975% QST it pays, and registration normally follows from making taxable supplies in Quebec. An Ontario business with no QST registration treats the QST on a Quebec invoice as part of the cost of the expense. Check Revenu Quebec for the registration rules.

There is no federal rent rebate. Relief for renters comes through provincial credits claimed on your return, and eligibility turns on residency, family income and rent paid in the year. Ontario renters may qualify for the energy and property tax credit paid through the Ontario Trillium Benefit; Manitoba and Quebec run their own renter-related credits. You must file a return to receive any of them, even with no income, and keep proof of rent paid.

You remain responsible for what your return says, even when someone else prepared it, so the CRA assesses the tax, interest and penalties against you. A preparer who makes or participates in a false statement can face third-party penalties of their own, and may be liable to you for negligence, which is why engagement terms and professional insurance matter. Keep your source documents for six years from the end of the tax year they relate to.

If you are registered for GST/HST, record expenses net of the tax and claim the tax portion as an input tax credit on your GST/HST return. Deducting it as an expense as well would claim the same amount twice. If you are not registered, the tax you paid is simply part of the cost and is deducted with it. Keep supplier invoices showing the tax and the supplier's registration number, because the CRA can ask for them.

No. Money you borrow is not income, so a student loan does not go on your return and changes nothing about your tax bill when you receive it or when you repay it. Grants, bursaries and scholarships are different: those arrive on a tax slip and may need to be reported, although full-time students often find the scholarship exemption covers them. The only tax benefit tied to the loan itself is the credit for interest paid on a government student loan.

Usually yes, if you are not registered. Non-resident digital suppliers such as ad networks and software subscriptions must register under CRA's digital economy rules and charge GST/HST to Canadian customers who are not registered themselves. If you give the platform a valid GST/HST number, it generally stops charging the tax and you account for it yourself where the rules require. Tax charged on genuine business purchases is normally recoverable as an input tax credit once you are registered.

You can ask, but no employer has to issue it before the CRA's annual slip deadline shortly after year end, and payroll often cannot finalise the numbers until then. If you need figures sooner, use your last pay statement of the year for gross pay, income tax, CPP and EI to date. Slips also appear in CRA My Account once the employer files them. Filing from an estimate invites a reassessment later, so wait for the slip.

There is no minimum income that switches filing on. You must file if you owe tax, if the CRA asks you to, if you disposed of capital property, or if you have to repay benefits. Below the federal basic personal amount, $16,452 for 2026 and reduced at higher incomes, you generally owe no federal tax. Filing is still how you claim the GST/HST credit, the Canada child benefit and provincial credits, so file anyway.

The Income Tax Act is the federal statute that sets out how income tax works in Canada: who is taxable, how income, deductions and credits are computed, and what powers the CRA has to assess and collect. It is amended most years by budget legislation, and the consolidated text is published free on the Justice Laws website. Regulations, CRA guidance and court decisions sit alongside it. Provinces have their own income tax statutes, and Quebec administers its own.

The eligible dependant amount, once known as equivalent to spouse, is for a person who had no spouse or common-law partner during the year, or who was separated, and who supported a related dependant living with them in a home they maintained. The dependant is usually a minor child, or a parent or other relative who is dependent because of an impairment. One claim per dwelling and one claim per dependant, and it cannot be combined with the spousal amount.

Payments from a registered source, such as an annuity bought with RRSP or pension money, are fully taxable as income in the year received. A non-registered annuity is taxed only on its interest element, because the rest of each payment returns your own capital: a prescribed annuity spreads that interest evenly across the payments, while a non-prescribed one reports more of it in the early years. Slips report the taxable portion annually.