Frequently asked questions

We provide comprehensive accounting services including tax planning & preparation, audit & assurance, corporate restructuring, financial advisory, and immigration/emigration filing services for businesses and individuals across Canada.

Yes! While our office is located in downtown Montreal, we serve clients across all of Canada through secure virtual consultations. Our team supports you from anywhere in the world.

We proudly serve clients in English, French, Arabic, and Hindi, ensuring clear communication and culturally aware financial guidance.

You can contact us by phone at (438) 375-3649, email at connect@aandsfinancials.ca, or fill out the contact form on our website. We typically respond within 24 hours.

Yes, our team consists of Chartered Professional Accountants (CPAs) certified by the Order of CPAs of Quebec, bringing years of expertise to every client engagement.

Yes. The obligation attaches to the corporation's existence, not its income. A nil return is quick to prepare and avoids the problems that surface later — outstanding returns block dissolution and hold up the compliance certificates a buyer or lender will ask for.

It is rarely decided by the rate alone. Salary is deductible to the corporation, creates RRSP room and builds QPP entitlement, but requires a payroll account and remittances. Dividends avoid payroll administration entirely but build neither. Most owner-managers end up with a mix, sized to the corporation's income and their own needs.

It records money moving between you and the corporation. Amounts you take out must generally be repaid by the end of the corporation's next fiscal year, or they are added to your personal income for the year you took them — which means reopening a return that has already been assessed.

For most Québec corporations the annual update to the Registraire des entreprises is filed through the CO-17, so it is handled alongside the tax return. Corporations that file it separately need to keep the registration current independently.

Usually when retained earnings have built up in an operating company that carries trade risk, or when a sale is being contemplated and the operating company needs purifying for the capital gains exemption. Both benefit from being set up well ahead of the event rather than once a buyer is at the table.

It depends on whether profit exceeds what you draw personally. Incorporation defers tax on retained earnings, so if everything is withdrawn each year the benefit largely disappears while the compliance cost remains. Liability protection and an eventual sale are the other two reasons that often decide it.

Once taxable supplies exceed $30,000 over four consecutive calendar quarters — a rolling test, not a calendar-year one, counting worldwide supplies of the business and its associates. Registering voluntarily before that is often worthwhile if you have significant taxable purchases.

A salary is deductible if it is reasonable for work actually performed — the work has to be real and the amount defensible. Dividends are constrained by the tax on split income rules, which apply the top rate unless an exclusion is met, such as a sufficient labour contribution.

Expenses incurred to earn business income, with personal portions removed. Home office and vehicle costs are the two apportionments most often reviewed, so keep a mileage log and a defensible basis for the home office share. Meals and entertainment are restricted, and capital purchases are claimed through CCA rather than expensed.

A corporation sets it by filing its first T2 for a period ending on that date — there is no separate election, which is why it is often chosen by default. A year end just after your busiest season gives a clean trading cycle and time to prepare. Changing it later requires CRA approval and a business reason.

Yes. Québec is the only province that collects its own personal income tax, so residents file a federal T1 and a provincial TP-1. The income figures largely match but the credits do not — Québec has its own rates, brackets and credits with no federal equivalent.

You file a Québec provincial return, because residency on December 31 governs. Where tax was withheld for the wrong province — common with an out-of-province employer — a transfer of the withheld amount can be requested so it is credited where it is actually owed.

Normally three years from the date of the original notice of assessment. That limit does not apply where there was a misrepresentation attributable to neglect, carelessness or wilful default, or where the disposition of a property was never reported at all.

File them, starting with the oldest, and address it before the CRA makes contact. The Voluntary Disclosures Program can relieve penalties and part of the interest, but only where the disclosure is genuinely voluntary — it closes the moment the CRA raises the issue with you.

Yes, including rental statements, capital gains and adjusted cost base tracking, and foreign income reporting. Where foreign property costs more than CAD 100,000 in total, a T1135 is also required — the penalties for missing it are among the harshest in the system.

We work in the major cloud platforms — QuickBooks Online, Xero and similar — so your books stay current and accessible to you as well as to us. We can also take over an existing file rather than starting fresh.

Yes — pay runs, source deductions to both the CRA and Revenu Québec, records of employment, and year-end T4 and RL-1 slips. We also handle the taxable benefit calculations that most payroll errors come from.

The CRA and Revenu Québec assign a frequency — quarterly, monthly or accelerated — based on your average remittance over prior periods. It is reassigned as payroll grows, and the notice is easy to miss, so we confirm the current schedule as part of onboarding.

Yes. Catch-up work is a large part of what we do — reconstructing reconciliations, correcting sales tax accounts and filing overdue returns. Where remittances were missed, addressing it before the CRA makes contact preserves options that disappear afterwards.

Volume is not the test; consequence is. A corporation with a handful of transactions still needs a reconciled sales tax account, correct capital-versus-expense classification and a defensible shareholder loan balance. Those are where the assessments come from, not from transaction count.

Generally six years from the end of the last tax year the records relate to. Records supporting the cost of capital property should be kept longer — until after the property is disposed of and the reassessment period for that year has run.

You must register once your taxable supplies exceed $30,000 over four consecutive calendar quarters, measured on a rolling basis rather than by calendar year. Some businesses — taxi and ride-share drivers among them — must register from their first dollar of revenue. Below the threshold registration is optional, but it is often worth doing voluntarily so you can recover the GST and QST on start-up costs.

For most registrants Revenu Québec administers both taxes, so you deal with one agency rather than two and generally file them together. GST is 5% and QST is 9.975%, and QST is calculated on the pre-GST amount rather than compounded on top of the GST — a $100 sale carries $5.00 GST and $9.98 QST.

Your assigned reporting period depends on your taxable supplies: annual up to $1.5 million, quarterly up to $6 million, and monthly above that. You can elect to file more frequently than required, which many businesses do — quarterly instead of annually usually makes the payments easier to manage and gets refunds back faster.

The Quick Method lets eligible businesses with up to $400,000 in annual taxable supplies remit a reduced flat rate on their tax-included sales instead of tracking input tax credits. It typically benefits service businesses with few taxable purchases and typically costs money for businesses buying significant inventory or equipment. We compare both approaches on your actual figures before electing.

You can recover GST/HST paid on purchases made to produce taxable supplies, provided you hold a supplier invoice showing their registration number. Mixed-use expenses must be apportioned to the business share, meals and entertainment are generally restricted to 50%, and some items such as club memberships are excluded outright. In Québec the equivalent claim is called an input tax refund.

Late returns attract penalties and interest from both agencies, and prolonged non-filing can lead the CRA or Revenu Québec to issue an arbitrary assessment based on their own estimate of your sales. The Voluntary Disclosures Program can reduce or eliminate penalties on returns you bring forward yourself, but only if you act before the agency contacts you about them. We handle catch-up filings regularly.

For a corporation, in the last quarter before your fiscal year end — that is when the compensation mix, bonus accruals, CCA claim and shareholder loan position can still be changed. For personal planning, before December 31, with RRSP contributions running 60 days into the new year.

Within the tax on split income rules. Dividends to a related person attract the top rate unless an exclusion is met — a sufficient labour contribution, shares meeting the excluded shares conditions, or age-based exclusions. A reasonable salary for work actually performed remains straightforward.

Usually when retained earnings have built up in an operating company carrying trade risk, or when a sale is contemplated and the operating company needs purifying for the capital gains exemption. It adds a T2, a CO-17 and its own bookkeeping, so it has to earn that cost.

No. Fees depend on the structure, the number of entities and the state of the records, and quoting a number without knowing those would be guessing. We scope the work in a call and quote before starting.

Often substantially, but the conditions look backward. The capital gains exemption on qualifying small business corporation shares has asset-composition and holding-period tests measured over a preceding period, so a structure created once a buyer is at the table frequently cannot deliver the result.

We combine accounting insight with forward planning — budgeting, financial analysis and modeling, cash-flow forecasting and financing analysis — to help you make better business and personal decisions.

Yes. We build financial models and forecasts for budgeting, financing, growth scenarios and investment decisions, tailored to your business.

Yes. We're based in Montréal but deliver financial advisory and planning services remotely to clients across Canada.

No. A financial planner or investment advisor is typically licensed to recommend and sell investment products. A CPA financial advisor works on the accounting and tax side of the same decisions — what a choice costs after tax, whether it is affordable, and how it will be reported. Many clients use both, and we work alongside your investment advisor rather than replacing them.

No. We do not manage portfolios and we do not sell securities, mutual funds or insurance — those are regulated activities we are not registered for, and we earn no commission on any product. Our only revenue is the professional fee you agree to in advance, which is why our advice can be genuinely product-neutral.

No. Reviews are routine, largely automated and run in very high volume every year. An audit is a broader examination of books and records and is initiated differently. A review resolved with documentation does not lead to one.

Ask the issuer for duplicates — pharmacies, clinics, charities, suppliers and childcare providers can normally reissue. Where a document genuinely cannot be recovered, send what you do have with an explanation. Partial substantiation is treated better than silence, which is an automatic disallowance.

You can, but an authorised representative can deal with the auditor directly and control the scope of what is produced. The risk in handling it alone is not dishonesty; it is volunteering information that opens issues outside the original scope.

For income tax, an individual's collection is generally paused on the disputed amount until the objection is resolved. It is not paused for GST/HST or source deductions. Interest accrues either way, so paying an amount you expect to lose on can be cheaper than carrying it.

The Voluntary Disclosures Program exists for exactly this, and can relieve penalties and part of the interest. It closes the moment the CRA initiates contact about the issue — including contact directed at a related person or corporation — so the window is narrower than people expect.

Most property is deemed to have been acquired at its fair market value on the date you became a resident, so gains accrued before arrival are generally outside the Canadian net. Documenting those values at the time is far easier than reconstructing them years later on a sale.

If the total cost of specified foreign property exceeds CAD 100,000 at any point in the year, a T1135 is required. It is an information return rather than an extra tax, but the penalties for missing it are among the harshest in the system and the reassessment period is extended.

Yes, by posting acceptable security with the CRA. Payment is deferred until the property is actually disposed of, and no interest accrues on the deferred amount. It has to be arranged as part of the departure filing rather than requested afterwards.

Re-establishing residency starts a new cost base at the value on the date of return for most property. Where departure tax was deferred and the property was never sold, an election may unwind the deemed disposition — worth reviewing before you re-enter, not after.

It depends on where you were resident on December 31 of the departure year and whether you retain Québec-source income. The federal and Québec residency determinations follow similar principles but are made separately, and they do not always land in the same place.

Gross, not net. Record the full sale, the platform commission as an expense, and the sales tax separately. Booking only the net deposit understates revenue and expenses and misstates the tax you collected — which you remain liable to remit regardless of what the platform withheld.

In establishments where tipping is customary, an employer may be required to allocate tips where the amounts employees declare fall short of a percentage of taxable sales. Tips also form part of pensionable and insurable earnings, so they affect QPP, EI and QPIP calculations.

Québec requires restaurant operators to record transactions through an approved module and issue a compliant bill to the customer. The data is reported to Revenu Québec, which compares it against your filed returns — so the books and the module have to agree.

Meals provided to employees are generally a taxable benefit unless an exception applies, and the deduction limitation on meals and entertainment restricts the recoverable portion of the sales tax as well. Treating them as ordinary food cost is a common misstatement.

Often no. It cannot create a rental loss, and it produces recapture on a sale above the remaining balance. For a property you expect to appreciate, deferring the claim usually beats taking a deduction now against a larger inclusion later.

That is a change of use, which is a deemed disposition of the whole property at fair market value — a gain arises even though nothing was sold. An election can defer recognition, but it has conditions and cannot be filed retroactively without relief, so it should be dealt with at the time.

Yes, since 2016, even where the exemption covers the entire gain. Failing to report can cost the exemption or attract a penalty, and the CRA can reassess the year indefinitely where a disposition was never reported at all.

Usually not. Short holding periods, a pattern of similar transactions and financing that only worked on a quick resale point to business income, taxed in full. Assignment sales are a particular focus, and the sales tax treatment on an assignment is a separate question again.

Only if income meaningfully exceeds what you draw personally — the benefit is deferral on retained earnings. If you take everything out each year you gain little and add two corporate returns, financial statements and possibly a payroll account. The personal services business risk also needs assessing first.

Multiple clients, your own equipment and workspace, control over how and when you work, a real chance of profit and risk of loss, and contracts that reflect those facts. The contract wording alone does not decide it — the CRA and Revenu Québec look at the actual working relationship.

For most consultants, yes, because taxable operating costs are a small share of revenue. Compare a full year both ways using your real figures before electing, and note that certain professions are excluded and there are minimum periods the election must remain in effect.

The portion of home costs attributable to the workspace, apportioned by area and by time where the space is shared. Keep the basis of the apportionment documented — home office is one of the two claims most often selected for review, the other being vehicle expenses.

Yes — and accountants for medical professionals more broadly. We work with doctors, physicians, surgeons, dentists and other healthcare professionals on incorporation, compensation planning and combined corporate and personal tax — in Montréal and Québec in person, and across Canada remotely.

The test is whether your practice earns meaningfully more than your household spends. If it does, income can stay in the corporation and be taxed at the lower corporate rate until you draw it, and that deferral is worth real money. If you need everything you earn to live on, incorporating mostly adds cost. We run the numbers before recommending either way.

Salary creates RRSP room and CPP/QPP contributions and is deductible to the corporation; dividends create neither but avoid payroll contributions. Most incorporated physicians end up with a mix that is reset each year rather than fixed once, based on RRSP or pension plans, spousal income and how much needs to stay in the corporation.

We serve medical practitioners across Canada directly rather than referring out. Our Montréal office handles Québec clients in person, and physicians in Ontario, Alberta, British Columbia and elsewhere work with us remotely through secure document exchange and video meetings. Provincial rules on professional corporations differ and we account for the province you practise in.

Yes, and we think it is the only sensible way to do this work. We prepare the professional corporation's T2 and CO-17 alongside your personal T1 and TP-1 so remuneration, instalments and year-end decisions are made once, with both sides visible.

Dental and veterinary practices carry significant equipment and leasehold investment, so capital cost allowance and financing analysis matter more. Pharmacists and any practice selling products can have both taxable and exempt revenue, which makes the GST/QST position something to work out rather than assume, since most healthcare services are exempt and their input tax credits generally are not recoverable.

Before your first year of independent practice, not after it. Residents have tax withheld at source; newly independent physicians usually do not, and the first full year's bill arrives with instalment obligations attached. Setting up instalments and bookkeeping correctly at the start is far cheaper than reconstructing a year later.

No. One GST/HST registration covers all provinces, and you charge the destination province's rate. QST is a separate registration administered by Revenu Québec. Provincial sales taxes in British Columbia, Saskatchewan and Manitoba are separate regimes again and may require registration there.

Not quite. Marketplace collection rules shift the remittance obligation for qualifying supplies, but you still need records reconciling platform reports to your own returns, and sales outside the marketplace remain yours to handle.

Gross. Record the full sale, then commissions, advertising, refunds and chargebacks as separate expenses, and the sales tax separately. The net deposit is a cash movement, not a revenue figure, and treating it as revenue understates the whole picture.

Possibly. Inventory held in a US warehouse can create state-level nexus and, depending on the facts and the treaty, a US federal filing obligation. This should be reviewed before inventory moves, since the obligation attaches from the point the stock is held.

When you have a legal right to receive it, which generally follows the expiry of the lien period after substantial completion rather than the date of actual payment. Documentation of the completion date is what supports the position if it is questioned.

Yes, but the timing of the remittance obligation follows its own rules and does not always match income recognition. Remitting tax on an amount not yet collected is a common source of cash strain on construction contracts, so the timing is worth confirming for each contract structure.

The contract wording does not decide it. Control over how the work is done, ownership of tools, chance of profit and risk of loss do. A reassessment makes the payer liable for both employer and employee shares of the deductions that should have been withheld, plus penalties and interest.

No — equipment goes into a CCA class and is deducted over time at the rate for that class, with the half-year rule generally applying in the year of acquisition. Accelerated incentives have modified this for certain classes and periods, so the applicable rule depends on when it was put in use.

Contemporaneous ones: time tracked to projects as the work happens, design and architecture documents, test results, and records of the technological uncertainties you faced and how you addressed them. Timesheets reconstructed after the fact are the most common reason a claim is cut back.

It can end CCPC status if the investor gains control in law or in fact, which would cost the small business deduction, the enhanced SR&ED treatment and the capital gains exemption on the shares. Review the shareholders' agreement alongside the share register before signing.

Compensation expense is recognised from the grant date over the vesting period for accounting purposes, while the employee's tax treatment arises on exercise and depends on whether the shares qualify for the stock option deduction. The two follow different timelines and both need to be tracked.

Whether the books reconcile to the cap table, whether revenue recognition is consistent and defensible, whether contractor relationships would survive an employment reassessment, and whether tax filings and remittances are current. Cleaning those up takes months, so it is worth doing before a process starts.

No. Professional liability follows the professional personally, and the ordre's rules require insurance precisely because incorporation does not limit it. A corporation can limit exposure to ordinary commercial creditors — leases, suppliers, employment claims — but not to professional negligence.

That is decided first by your ordre's regulation, which often restricts ownership to members of the profession, and only then by the tax on split income rules, which apply the top rate to dividends paid to a related person who does not meet an exclusion.

When earnings meaningfully exceed what you need to draw personally, because the benefit is deferral on what stays in. There is no universal number — it depends on your personal spending, your other income, and whether the practice has a saleable value.

Subject to the ordre's ownership rules, which usually restrict who may acquire the shares. Where a share sale is possible, the capital gains exemption on qualifying small business corporation shares may apply — but its asset-composition and holding-period tests look back over a preceding period, so structuring has to happen well before a sale.

For some Ontario health professions the college's rules permit family member share ownership, subject to conditions. Even where permitted, dividends to a related person face the tax on split income rules, which apply the top rate unless an exclusion is met. Both questions have to be answered, in that order.

Most medical and dental services to patients are exempt, so no HST is charged and no input tax credits can be claimed on the costs of providing them. Cosmetic procedures, certain third-party reports and consulting or teaching income can be taxable, which changes the analysis.

Yes. Incorporation support, corporate and personal tax filing, compensation planning and bookkeeping are all handled online. We work with physicians and dentists in Ancaster, Dundas, Hamilton and across Ontario the same way we work with our Montréal clients.

Usually a mix. Salary creates RRSP room, builds CPP entitlement and supports mortgage applications but requires payroll remittances; dividends avoid payroll administration but build neither. The right balance depends on your retained earnings, personal cash needs and long-term plans.

Remotely. Corporate and personal tax filing, HST returns, T5018 reporting and job costing are all handled online, and none of them require a local office. We work with contractors from Whitby through the Greater Toronto Area and across the province the same way we work with Montréal clients.

13% HST, on the same GST/HST registration you would already hold. There is no separate Ontario registration. If you also work in Québec you charge GST plus QST there, on a separate QST registration administered by Revenu Québec.

When you have a legal right to receive it, which follows Ontario's Construction Act timelines around substantial performance and lien expiry rather than the invoice date. The dates differ from Québec's, which is why contractors working in both provinces need the treatment set per project.

No. Ontario corporate income tax is administered by the CRA and calculated within the federal T2, so there is a single corporate filing. That is one of the practical differences from Québec, where a separate CO-17 goes to Revenu Québec.

No. Alberta has no provincial sales tax, so you charge 5% GST only. If you also work in provinces that have one — QST in Québec, HST in Ontario and the Atlantic provinces, or PST in British Columbia, Saskatchewan and Manitoba — the destination province's rules apply to those supplies.

Yes. Alberta administers its own corporate income tax, so a corporation with a permanent establishment there files an AT1 with Alberta Tax and Revenue Administration in addition to the federal T2. It is structurally similar to Québec's CO-17.

Yes. GST returns, T2 and AT1 filings, T5018 reporting, payroll and job costing are all handled remotely. We work with contractors in Calgary, Edmonton and across the province, and the province you operate in changes the filings rather than the way we work.

When the right to receive it arises under the Prompt Payment and Construction Lien Act timelines rather than on the invoice date. Because the periods differ between provinces, contractors working across borders need the recognition point set per project rather than as a single company-wide policy.