Accountant and CPA for Windsor and Essex County businesses

For a one-owner Windsor corporation, our accounting fees for monthly bookkeeping, payroll and the year-end T2 with statements usually run from $500 to $700 a month all-in.

A border city keeps two currencies in its books

Few Canadian cities trade so closely with the US. A Windsor mould shop quotes Michigan in US dollars, carriers are paid in US dollars for Detroit runs, greenhouses sell through US distributors. The ledger is in Canadian dollars, so every US item is translated, and the gap between invoice-date and receipt-date rates is income or loss.

It needs deliberate setup: a US-dollar bank account in the books, one rate source and month-end revaluation. See foreign exchange gains and losses. Goods exported to US customers are generally zero-rated: no HST charged, credits still claimed. HST on exports covers the proof.

What Ontario adds to a Windsor file

Ontario sales tax is simple: one 13% HST registration and return. Corporate tax rides on the T2. Employer Health Tax applies above the exemption, and most construction and manufacturing employers carry WSIB.

Ontario corporations also file an Ontario Business Registry annual return within six months of year-end, outside the CRA calendar and easily missed. See Ontario tax facts and the Ontario accounting guide.

The industries that shape the work here

Essex County’s economy leans on a handful of sectors, and each one brings its own accounting pattern. We have written a page for each:

• Manufacturers: tool, die and mould makers and automotive suppliers, with job costing, work in progress, heavy equipment and SR&ED claims on process work.
• Trucking and logistics: cross-border carriers and owner-operators, with IFTA and IRP, US-dollar revenue and long-haul meal claims.
• Greenhouse growers: Leamington and Kingsville operations taxed as farms, with energy costs, zero-rated produce and seasonal workers.
• Construction contractors: T5018 slips, the 10% holdback under the Construction Act, progress billing and WSIB.
• Retailers: inventory counts, shrinkage, point-of-sale reconciliation and HST.

Services Windsor owners use most

Most engagements combine several of these under one fixed monthly or annual fee:

• Bookkeeping in Windsor: monthly reconciliation, US-dollar accounts kept straight, and the HST return filed from the same ledger.
• Corporate tax in Windsor: the T2 and year-end statements, with CCA on equipment and planning before the year closes.
• Personal tax in Windsor: T1 returns for owners, families and residents who earn income in Michigan.
• Payroll in Windsor: source deductions, EHT, WSIB reporting and T4 slips.

Where the decisions have outgrown a monthly close, fractional controller or fractional CFO support adds cash-flow forecasting and margin reporting.

How a Windsor owner’s year runs

Your year-end, not December, sets the calendar. Books close monthly, and before year-end we raise open decisions: equipment timing, salary-dividend mix, retaining profit. The T2 is due six months after year-end, but the balance owing two or three months after, which catches owners out. The Ontario return has its own six-month clock, and T4, T4A and T5 slips go out by the last day of February. Deadline reminders can email you the dates.

What it costs

Fees are fixed in writing after review, so a June question does not start a meter. Bookkeeping starts at $325 a month with HST included; personal returns from $125; self-employed T1s commonly $275 to $500. Corporate tax alone is quoted after review. A 45-minute Advice Call is a flat $225 + GST. See the pricing page.

Remote

EverStone serves Windsor remotely. There is no Windsor office and no staff based there. Video, phone, secure upload and e-signature cover everything; see the guide to working with an out-of-province CPA.