Restaurant accountant in Kelowna

For a one-owner Kelowna restaurant, monthly bookkeeping, payroll and the year-end T2 with statements usually cost from $500 to $700 a month all-in. The year-end covers the T2 with Schedule 1 and Schedule 50, the CCA schedule, the small business deduction, T4 or T5 slips for the owner’s pay, and the instalments for the year ahead.

If you pour your own wine rather than someone else’s, the Kelowna winery page covers the excise and inventory side.

A summer that has to pay for the winter

Lake-country hospitality earns much of its year between the long weekends, when tourists, boaters, wedding parties and festival crowds fill the patios; then the valley goes quiet. Rent, insurance, equipment leases, core staff and loan payments do not. A restaurant profitable over the year can still be short of cash in March.

Treat the summer as a reserve, not a windfall. GST and PST collected in July, and source deductions from July’s payroll, belong to the government and should sit in a separate account until filed. A monthly fixed-cost figure measured against a realistic winter shows what summer must leave behind, with room for a smoke season or a wet June. Cash flow for a seasonal business sets out the method.

The off-season is when renovations happen. A new patio, bar or kitchen line bought in winter is recovered over time through capital cost allowance, and leasehold improvements follow their own schedule. Timing against your year-end changes the first year’s deduction, so talk before paying the deposit.

Seasonality also argues for a year-end in the quiet months. A count and a close in the middle of August compete with service; the same work in the winter gets done properly.

Tips and a staff that turns over every season

Spring brings new servers, cooks and bussers, many gone by fall, each needing correct setup before the first pay and a record of employment on leaving. Tips the employer controls, such as a pooled tip-out through the till, generally go through payroll with CPP and EI; tips handed straight to a server are treated differently. BC employment standards limit what an employer can take from tips, so put the policy in writing and follow it.

Whether staff meals and shift drinks are a taxable benefit depends on the circumstances, so set a policy. At season’s end, send records of employment promptly; laid-off servers depend on them. Controlled versus direct tips explains the line, and the Kelowna payroll page covers seasonal hiring and ROEs.

GST on the meal, PST on the drink

BC sales tax splits on almost every restaurant bill. GST applies to prepared food and drink; PST generally does not apply to food but does apply to liquor, so drinks carry both taxes and the meal one. Take-home packaged goods, gift cards, catering, private events and merchandise each need their own setting, and a gift card is not a sale until redeemed.

Tax is set item by item in the point-of-sale system, and one wrong code repeats on every sale all summer. We review the settings at the start and whenever the menu changes. The BC PST guide covers registration and returns.

Point-of-sale totals, card deposits and delivery payouts

Point-of-sale sales never match the bank deposit. Processors take fees and batch deposits, delivery platforms pay weeks later net of commission and funded promotions, cash waits in a float or safe, and voids, comps and refunds shift the totals.

We book gross daily sales and every fee, and reconcile each processor and platform account to zero monthly; fees seen only in a smaller deposit are lost deductions. The Kelowna bookkeeping page covers the close. This monthly reconciliation is the core of what hospitality accountants do for a restaurant, because it turns the year-end into a handful of timing items.

What EverStone handles for you

One firm, one fixed fee agreed up front:

• T2 corporate return and year-end financial statements
• Point-of-sale, card processor and delivery platform reconciliations
• Payroll for a seasonal team, including tip treatment, ROEs and year-end slips
• GST and PST set up correctly across food, liquor and everything else on the till
• Food, liquor and labour cost reported monthly against sales
• Equipment, patio and leasehold improvement schedules

Fixed fees, fully online

EverStone is a CPA firm working with Kelowna operators entirely online — video, phone and secure upload link. The fee is fixed and agreed before work starts. See what it costs.

Remote restaurant accounting

EverStone is a CPA firm serving Kelowna clients online. There is no Kelowna office and no local staff. Meetings are by video or phone, documents move by secure upload link and e-signature, and daily sales, tips and costs are tracked from the systems you already run.