Bookkeeping for Regina businesses

Bookkeeping for businesses in Regina, White City, Emerald Park and Moose Jaw runs the same way: bank and card feeds come in electronically, receipts arrive through a secure upload link, and the month is closed before the next one starts.

Two sales taxes, two registrations, two returns

Saskatchewan did not harmonise with the GST. A Regina business registered for both files its GST return with the CRA and its PST return with the Saskatchewan Ministry of Finance, each on its own schedule and under its own account number. The ledger needs a separate liability account for each, because the two are collected on different bases and remitted to different governments.

The mistake that follows most often is a single "sales tax payable" account that mixes the two. It balances nicely until one return is filed and the other is not, and then nobody can say which part of the balance belongs to whom. We keep them apart from the first entry. GST registration sets out when the federal side becomes compulsory: once taxable sales pass $30,000 in four consecutive calendar quarters.

PST paid is a cost, not a credit

GST paid on business purchases is generally recoverable as an input tax credit. Saskatchewan PST is not. When a Regina business pays PST on a laptop, a skid steer or a shop supply order, that tax is part of what the item cost, and it belongs in the same account as the item.

For equipment this matters beyond the monthly statement. PST paid on a capital asset is added to its cost, so it becomes part of the base for capital cost allowance. Coded to a tax account by mistake, it is neither recovered nor depreciated. We code it where it belongs on the day the bill arrives.

What you bring into the province

PST in Saskatchewan attaches to goods and taxable services consumed or used in the province, wherever the seller is. An online order from a supplier in another province, a used truck bought from out of province, or software billed from outside Canada can all carry PST that nobody charged at the till. Where the seller did not collect it, the Regina buyer generally has to self-assess and remit it on the PST return.

Monthly bookkeeping is where that gets caught. An annual clean-up rarely looks at which vendors charged PST and which did not; a monthly review of purchases does, and it spots the out-of-province invoice before it becomes a finding on a provincial audit.

No payroll levy, but WCB still accrues

Saskatchewan has no employer health tax or payroll levy of the kind Ontario, Manitoba or British Columbia charge. For a Regina employer, the statutory costs above wages are CPP, EI and premiums to the Saskatchewan Workers’ Compensation Board. WCB premiums are set by an industry rate code applied to assessable payroll, so the cost moves with the payroll rather than arriving as a fixed bill.

We accrue it as payroll is run. A contractor or a trucking firm with a large summer crew otherwise meets the true cost of that crew months later, when the year-end reconciliation to WCB comes in higher than anyone budgeted. Payroll in Regina covers the pay runs themselves.

How Regina’s industries use the books

The same ledger does different jobs depending on who owns it. Farms around Regina often report on the cash method and still claim input tax credits on inputs, because most farm products are zero-rated. Energy services firms need job costing that survives a quiet quarter. Contractors need progress billings, holdbacks and subcontractor payments tracked for T5018 slips. Trucking operators need fuel and kilometres by jurisdiction, and consultants billing government and Crown corporations need clean receivables and GST charged the way the purchaser expects.

Why a Regina ledger does not need a Regina office

GST is federal and Saskatchewan corporate tax is collected through the federal T2, so nothing about the work depends on being in the province. EverStone is a sole practitioner CPA firm at 32615 South Fraser Way in Abbotsford, British Columbia: no Regina office and no local staff. The file sits in cloud accounting software you hold your own login to, and one CPA keeps the monthly ledger and prepares the year end from it.

Saskatchewan stays on Central Standard Time all year, so Regina runs one hour ahead of Abbotsford in summer and two in winter. Our morning is your late morning; a question sent before lunch is usually answered the same day.