BC PST: who registers, what is taxable, and what changes in October 2026

BC small business owners spend a lot of energy on GST — and then discover the province runs a second, completely separate sales tax with different rules, different registration and no input credits. Provincial sales tax (PST) is a 7% retail sales tax on taxable goods and certain services in BC, and whether it touches your business depends on what you sell, not how big you are. With BC extending PST to a set of professional services on October 1, 2026, this is the year to get your answer right.

PST is not GST with a different name

The two taxes share a checkout line and nothing else. GST is federal, value-added, and refunds you the tax on business inputs through input tax credits. PST is provincial, retail-stage, and keeps every dollar: there is no ITC equivalent. If you pay PST on a work truck's accessories, tools or software subscriptions, that 7% is simply part of the cost. And registration is separate too — being GST-registered says nothing about your PST obligations, and vice versa.

Who has to register

You must register if, in the ordinary course of business in BC, you:

• Sell taxable goods — retail inventory, building materials, vehicles, equipment, boats and most other tangible items;
• Lease taxable goods — equipment, vehicles, tools, artwork;
• Provide services to taxable goods — repair, installation and restoration work on things like vehicles and equipment;
• Provide software or telecommunication services in BC;
• Provide legal services, or — from October 1, 2026 — specified professional services including accounting, architectural, engineering and certain security and non-residential real estate services;
• Operate an online marketplace facilitating BC sales.

Location is not a shield: out-of-province sellers soliciting BC customers can be caught, and online sales into BC are squarely in scope.

The $10,000 small-seller exemption

If your gross revenue from all retail sales was $10,000 or less in the previous 12 months, and you reasonably estimate $10,000 or less for the next 12, you can generally qualify as a small seller and stay unregistered — a genuine relief for hobby-scale and side operations. Two caveats: certain vendor types cannot qualify regardless of volume, and small sellers pay PST on their own inventory purchases. Registering voluntarily lets you buy goods for resale exempt with a PST number, which is often worth it even below the threshold once margins matter.

What is taxable, what is not

Goods are taxable unless specifically exempted; services are the reverse — historically exempt unless specifically listed. Common exemptions on the goods side include most food for human consumption, children's clothing and certain safety equipment. On the services side, the big historical exemption — professional and personal services — is precisely what narrows in October 2026. If you sell mixed bundles (goods plus service), the invoicing and allocation rules deserve care, because they decide how much of the invoice carries 7%.

The October 1, 2026 change: professional services

BC's extension of PST to specified professional services is the largest scope change in years. From October 1, 2026, accounting, architectural, engineering and certain security and non-residential real estate services become taxable. Two practical consequences for owners: your professional fees will start carrying 7% PST you cannot recover (unlike the GST on the same invoice), and if you provide one of those services, you have a registration and systems project to complete before the effective date — tax codes, invoices, contracts that straddle October 1, and quotes issued now for work delivered after it.

Contractors: the rule runs backwards

Trades improving real property — framing, plumbing, roofing, electrical — generally do not charge PST to their customers. Instead the contractor is treated as the end user of the materials and pays PST when buying them at the supplier counter. That flips the usual logic: your materials cost already includes the tax, your invoices to customers typically do not add it, and your pricing needs to absorb the 7% you paid upstream. Specific contract types can change this outcome, so trades with unusual arrangements (supply-only sales, work on production machinery) should confirm their treatment — it is a standard part of how we set up contractor files.

Filing and staying clean

Registered businesses file PST returns on the schedule the province assigns and remit everything collected. The discipline is the same one that keeps bookkeeping healthy: separate tax collected from revenue in the ledger, reconcile before filing, and never treat collected tax as working capital. PST assessments compound quietly because there is no offsetting credit — every missed dollar is a whole dollar.

This article is general information for Canadian business owners and is current as of July 2026. PST scope, exemptions and the October 2026 professional-services expansion have detailed rules and transitional provisions — confirm your specific situation. It is not tax advice; please speak with a CPA before acting on anything here.