T2 corporate tax return preparation
Every Canadian corporation files a T2, whether or not it made money and whether or not it traded at all. What varies is how much work sits behind it.
Quick answer: A T2 corporate return reports the corporation’s income for its own fiscal year. It is due six months after year end, and any balance owing is due two or three months after it — so the payment deadline arrives before the filing one. Preparation is quoted after a free consult, from a closed set of books.
What is included
- The T2 return and every schedule it needs, e-filed, with the confirmation sent to you.
- Year-end adjusting entries so the books and the return agree rather than diverging quietly.
- The capital cost allowance schedule, with the half-year rule and any disposals applied.
- The provincial return where the province administers its own, as Alberta and Quebec do.
- Salary and dividend planning for the owner, decided before the year closes rather than after.
- A written summary of what the year showed and what changed from the one before.
What we need from you
A closed set of books, or the records to close them. In practice that means the bank and credit card statements for the year, the payroll records, the sales tax filings, any loan statements, and the invoices for anything bought that will be depreciated rather than expensed.
Where the books are not closed, that is its own piece of work and it is quoted separately. Catch-up bookkeeping covers it, and doing it first is what keeps the return itself at the quoted fee.
The deadlines that actually bite
The filing deadline is six months after the fiscal year end. The payment deadline is earlier — two months after year end for most corporations, three for those claiming the small business deduction — which means a corporation that waits for the filing deadline has usually been accruing interest for months.
Instalments are a separate clock again. How corporate instalments work sets out when they start and how they are calculated.
Who this is for, and who it is not
A good fit: an incorporated Canadian business with a fiscal year to close, whether the books are ours or someone else’s, and whether the year is current or several behind.
Not a fit: a sole proprietor with no corporation, who files business income inside a personal return instead — that is a self-employed return. In either case we say so on the first call rather than quoting for work you do not need.
Common questions about the T2
Do we have to file if the corporation had no activity?+
Can you file a late or missed year?+
Is the financial statement included?+
Do you handle the personal return too?+
Talk to a CPA about this
One Chartered Professional Accountant, start to finish. Fixed fees, quoted in writing before any work begins, and no obligation from a first conversation.
“Sunny and his team have been completing my bookkeeping, taxes and financials for the last 2 years and they have been amazing. Thank you!”