Contractor accountant in Chilliwack

Holdbacks are the year-end problem

On residential and light commercial work, a portion of what you have earned is routinely retained until the job is complete. That creates a genuine timing question: the work was done, the invoice was issued, and the money is not yours yet. Treating a holdback as revenue on invoice date can push profit into a year before the cash exists; ignoring it understates the year the work was actually performed. GST does not always follow the invoice date either. For a Chilliwack builder running several jobs across a season, this is the single item most worth getting right at the cut-off.

Subcontractors, T5018s and classification

A construction business paying subcontractors for construction services generally files T5018 information returns. Behind that sits the harder question of whether a worker is a subcontractor at all — decided on the substance of the arrangement, not the wording of the invoice. Control over the work, who supplies tools, chance of profit or loss and ability to substitute all count. A framer who works only for you, on your schedule, with your tools is the classic exposure. See our subcontractor versus employee guide.

A season, not a year

Chilliwack construction income concentrates into the drier months, and instalments calculated on a flat projection sit awkwardly against that. Overpay through the winter and you have financed the CRA; underpay after a strong summer and the balance arrives with interest. We set instalments against your real pattern, and revisit them when the pattern changes — which for a growing builder is most years.

Equipment and the year-end purchase question

Trucks, trailers, excavators and shop tools are capital assets recovered through capital cost allowance at rates set by each asset’s class. In the year an asset becomes available for use the half-year rule generally halves the claim, while the Accelerated Investment Incentive suspends that for eligible property and can allow a substantially larger first-year deduction. Timing a purchase around your year-end is genuine planning — but only where the year’s income can actually use the deduction, which is a conversation worth having in autumn rather than spring.

Growing past yourself

Most Chilliwack trades reach a point where the next contract needs employees rather than more hours. That brings source deductions on a remittance schedule set by your withholding, year-end slips, and a sharper line between the crew you employ and the subs you engage. It is also the point where the salary-versus-dividend question becomes real, because there is now a genuine choice about how much profit stays in the company to fund the next truck or the next hire.

Barns, shops and agricultural-adjacent work

Chilliwack contractors work a market most Fraser Valley trades do not: a large agricultural base that needs barns, equipment sheds, processing space and the servicing that goes with them. That work behaves slightly differently on the books. Jobs tend to be larger and lumpier than residential, payment terms follow the farm’s own cash cycle rather than a builder’s draw schedule, and the customer is frequently an incorporated farm with its own year-end and its own reporting needs.

The practical consequences are worth planning for. Longer jobs mean more work in progress crossing the year-end. Farm customers paying after harvest can concentrate receipts into part of the year, which affects both instalments and how comfortable a strong year actually feels. And because agricultural buildings and improvements are treated as capital by the customer, the documentation they need from you is often more detailed than a residential client would ever ask for. We set the file up so that side of the work does not become a scramble each spring.

The other thing a Chilliwack builder should plan for is the gap between finishing a job and being paid for all of it. Between holdbacks, final inspections and a customer who pays on their own cycle, the last portion of a contract can sit outstanding for months after the crew has moved on. Two or three of those running at once is a real cash position, and it is invisible in a profit figure that already counts the work as earned. We track it explicitly so the number you plan from is the money you can actually use.

What EverStone handles for you

One CPA, one fixed fee agreed up front:

• T2 corporate return and year-end financial statements
• Holdbacks and work in progress reviewed at the cut-off
• T5018 subcontractor information returns
• Subcontractor-versus-employee positions documented defensibly
• Equipment and vehicle CCA schedules
• GST filed and reconciled
• Instalments planned around the building season

Fixed fees, fully online

EverStone is an Abbotsford CPA firm, half an hour down the highway — and the engagement still runs entirely online, by video, phone and secure upload, because that fits a day spent on site better than an appointment does. The fee is fixed and agreed before work starts. See what it costs.