Payroll services in Hamilton

Three payroll layers, three different bodies

Every pay run in Hamilton answers to three places. The CRA takes the federal layer: income tax, CPP and EI withheld from each employee, plus the employer’s share, remitted on the schedule assigned to your payroll account. The Ontario Ministry of Finance takes employer health tax. The Workplace Safety and Insurance Board takes premiums for workplace coverage. None of the three talks to the others, and each has its own account, deadlines and penalties. A payroll that only watches the CRA side can look fine for years before the other two surface. Payroll remittances and the RP account covers the federal schedule in detail.

Employer health tax: the band comes first

Ontario’s employer health tax is graduated. You pick the rate from the band table using total Ontario remuneration before the exemption, and only then subtract the $1,000,000 exemption and apply that rate to the rest. Doing it the other way round puts a growing Hamilton employer in a lower band than it belongs in. Associated corporations share one exemption and have to agree how to split it, which matters for a group that runs a fabrication company and a separate trucking company under one owner. The bands and the exemption are tabled with their source on the Ontario tax facts page.

WSIB on a shop floor and a job site

WSIB premiums depend on how your business is classified, and Hamilton’s mix of steel, fabrication and construction sits in the classes where classification matters most. A shop that also installs on site can end up with work in more than one class. A general contractor hiring subcontractors has a second concern: checking each sub’s WSIB clearance before paying them, because an uncovered sub can become the hiring contractor’s problem. We run the payroll figures that feed your WSIB reporting and keep clearance records alongside the sub’s invoices.

Shift work, overtime and a plant payroll

Manufacturing payrolls are rarely a flat salary. Shift premiums, overtime, statutory holiday pay and vacation pay all run through each cheque, and Ontario’s employment standards decide how each is worked out. A premium paid for an afternoon shift is taxable earnings like any other. Holiday pay in Ontario is based on recent wages and vacation pay, not on a flat day’s rate, so a policy copied from another province produces the wrong amount. We set up pay types once, so each run follows the rules rather than someone’s memory. Statutory holiday pay sets out the method.

Tips in a Hamilton restaurant pay run

From James Street North to Locke Street, restaurant payrolls turn on one question: who controls the tips. Where the employer collects and allocates them, through a pool or a formula, they are controlled tips and run through payroll with source deductions. Where a customer hands a tip straight to a server and the employer plays no part, they are direct tips and the employee reports them on their own return. The two sit side by side in most dining rooms, so the POS set-up and the payroll set-up have to agree. Tip reporting covers the distinction.

Drivers: on the payroll or on contract

Carriers running out of the QEW and 403 corridor use both company drivers and owner-operators, and the line between them is a payroll question before it is a tax one. An owner-operator with their own tractor, their own authority and several customers is usually a contractor. A driver in your truck, on your schedule, hauling only for you usually is not. If the CRA reclassifies a contractor as an employee, the unpaid CPP and EI come back to the carrier with interest. We look at each arrangement before the first cheque rather than after a ruling.

Slips, departures and the year end

T4 and T4A slips and their summaries are due by the last day of February. When an employee leaves, a record of employment has to be issued so they can claim EI, and Hamilton’s seasonal construction and patio hiring make that a regular task rather than a rare one. We issue ROEs as people leave, reconcile the year’s remittances to the T4 totals, and file the slips before the deadline. Records of employment covers when one is required.

Remote, from Abbotsford

EverStone is a one-CPA firm in Abbotsford, British Columbia. There is no Hamilton office and no staff in Ontario. Hamilton employers are served by video call, secure upload link and e-signature, and payroll suits that well: timesheets go in, pay stubs and remittances come out, and none of it needs a visit. Hamilton is three hours ahead, so hours approved at the end of your day are processed at the start of ours.