Affordable Small Business Financial Audit for Canadian Businesses

For the 2025 tax year the filing and payment deadline is 30 April 2026. If you or your spouse were self-employed, the filing deadline moves to 15 June 2026, but any balance owing is still due 30 April 2026. Interest starts the day after the payment deadline, and a late-filing penalty applies on top when a return with a balance owing is filed late. File on time even with nothing owing, because income-tested benefits are recalculated from the filed return.

Most people pay through online or telephone banking, adding the CRA as a payee and choosing the exact account and year, such as a personal balance owing or an instalment. The alternatives are CRA My Payment with a debit card, pre-authorised debit scheduled in My Account, a credit card or e-transfer through a third-party provider that charges its own fee, or paying at your bank with a remittance voucher. For the 2025 tax year the balance was due 30 April 2026.

There is no single rate. Federal personal income tax for 2026 runs through five brackets: 14%, then 20.5%, 26%, 29% and 33% on the highest band, and your province's brackets stack on top, so your combined marginal rate is the federal rate plus the provincial one. The 2026 federal basic personal amount is $16,452, tapering to $14,829 as net income rises from $181,440 to $258,482. Capital gains and Canadian dividends are taxed on a different basis.

Yes, the CRA does telephone people, usually about a balance owing, a missing return, an audit or to verify information, and calls can come from many different numbers, so caller ID proves nothing either way. A real agent never demands payment by gift card, cryptocurrency or e-transfer, never threatens immediate arrest or deportation, and never asks for a password. If a call feels wrong, hang up, check your balance and mail in My Account, then call back using a number from canada.ca.

Not automatically. Relief applies where goods are bought on a reserve, or bought off reserve and delivered to the reserve, by a status Indian, a band or a band-empowered entity, and to services performed on a reserve. Purchases used off reserve with no delivery to it normally carry GST/HST at the usual rate. The vendor has to record the buyer's status information to support the relief. The CRA's guidance for Indigenous peoples sets out the conditions and paperwork.

Exemptions come from specific rules, never from status alone. Registered charities and qualifying non-profits are exempt from income tax on their activities because Parliament chose to support that work. Income earned on a reserve by a person registered under the Indian Act is exempt. Diplomats get relief under international agreements. Most people who pay nothing are not exempt at all: their credits, starting with the basic personal amount, simply cover their income, and they still have to file.

Personal exemptions cover a limited quantity of cigarettes, cigars and manufactured tobacco, once you have been outside Canada long enough to qualify and the goods are with you. Above that quantity, or where the products are not stamped as Canadian duty-paid, you pay excise duty, a special duty, GST or HST and any provincial tobacco tax at the border. Check the Canada Border Services Agency page for the current allowances and rates before you travel.

There is no single CRA fax number. Fax lines belong to particular offices and programs, so the only reliable number is the one printed on the letter you are answering. Faxing without that reference risks your documents landing in the wrong queue. Submitting them through My Account, My Business Account or Represent a Client is faster and gives you a confirmation, which a fax does not.

Call the CRA's individual or business enquiries line, both listed on the Contact the CRA page at canada.ca. Have your social insurance number or business number, your date of birth, and a line amount from a recent return ready, because the agent verifies you before discussing anything. Lines are quietest early in the morning and outside filing season. You can also authorise someone to call on your behalf using form AUT-01.

Yes, where you owe. The late-filing penalty is 5% of the unpaid balance plus 1% for each full month the return is late, up to 12 months. It rises to 10% plus 2% a month, to 20 months, only where the CRA formally demanded the return and charged you a late-filing penalty in one of the three preceding years. Compound daily interest runs on the balance as well. With nothing owing, there is no penalty.

It is usually not taxed at a higher rate, it is withheld at one. A lump-sum payment has tax withheld at flat percentages that step up with the size of the payment, and because the amount lands on top of your salary for the year it can also reach a higher bracket at assessment. Any over-withholding comes back as a refund. Part of a retiring allowance tied to service before 1996 can often be transferred straight into an RRSP.

Yes. Being incarcerated does not remove the obligation to file: an inmate with taxable income, or one who wants benefits and credits to keep flowing, files a T1 for each year. A family member outside can prepare and file it once the inmate signs an authorisation, and institutional earnings are usually low enough that little or no tax is owed. Some benefit payments are reduced or suspended during a long period of incarceration, so check the CRA eligibility rules.