GST/HST filing in Vancouver

The rate follows the customer

The single most common sales tax error in a Vancouver business that grows nationally is charging 5% to everyone, because 5% is what applies at home. It is not what applies to the sale. GST/HST is charged at the rate for the place of supply, and the place of supply rules generally point at the customer rather than the seller. Sell into Ontario and the sale carries 13% HST. Sell into the participating Atlantic provinces and it carries 15%. Sell into Alberta and it carries 5% and nothing else. Sell within British Columbia and it carries 5% GST plus, where applicable, a separately administered 7% PST.

Undercharging is the expensive direction: the business owes the difference on sales where it never collected it, and by the time a review surfaces the pattern it has usually run across years of invoices. Overcharging is not free either, since tax collected in error is not the seller's to keep. The rules differ between goods, services and intangibles, and services in particular turn on the address of the recipient obtained in the ordinary course of business rather than on where the work was performed. Our guide to the place of supply rules works through the categories.

Exports and non-resident customers

Selling outside Canada changes the analysis again. Many exports of goods and services are zero-rated, meaning the sale is taxable at 0% and the seller retains full input tax credits on everything used to make it. That combination is favourable, and it is also conditional: the relief depends on the specific circumstances of the supply and, for goods, on the evidence that the property actually left the country. Documentation is what supports the treatment, and a business that zero-rates on the basis of a foreign billing address without export evidence is relying on an assumption rather than a rule.

Supplies to non-residents who are in Canada, or who have some connection here, are treated differently again. For a Vancouver business with international customers, this is a determination worth making once per customer arrangement and documenting, rather than deciding invoice by invoice. Our note on exports and non-residents covers the ground.

BC PST does not follow the federal rules at all

None of the above tells you anything about provincial tax, because British Columbia never harmonised. The 7% PST is administered by the BC Ministry of Finance under its own rules, registered separately, filed separately, and generally not recoverable by the purchaser — there is no PST input tax credit. It also reaches outward: businesses located outside British Columbia can be required to register and collect BC PST on sales into the province in defined circumstances, which is the mirror image of the problem a Vancouver seller has going the other way. The rates and administrators are tabled on the BC tax facts page, and the PST guide covers registration.

What is covered

• Place of supply determined for each category of sale you make
• Correct rate applied by province in your invoicing and point of sale
• Export and non-resident treatment assessed and documented
• GST/HST returns prepared and filed on your reporting period
• Input tax credits claimed across all activity, including zero-rated sales
• BC PST registration and returns where the province's rules apply
• Returns reconciled to the sales ledger by jurisdiction rather than in total

Remote, from outside the city

EverStone has no Vancouver office. The firm is a sole practitioner CPA practice operating from one location in Abbotsford, and Vancouver businesses are served entirely online through video meetings, secure document exchange and e-signature. For a company whose own customers are spread across several provinces and possibly several countries, the location of its accountant is rarely the constraint. One CPA holds the file, so the place of supply determinations made when a new market opens are the ones applied when the return is filed.