For a Tri-Cities owner-operator with a BC corporation, year-end work starts about eight weeks before the fiscal year ends and runs until the CPA has a reconciled file in hand. If your company closes its year on December 31, the eight weeks begin in early November. Use this checklist for an operating company in Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam or Port Moody, with extra lines further down for a personal real estate corporation (PREC) and a HoldCo with rental condos.
The reason to start early is that the payment deadline comes before the filing deadline. Tax owing is generally due two or three months after year-end, while the T2 isn't due for six. A file that reaches the CPA late gets you a tax bill after the payment date.
Which deadlines follow a BC corporation's year-end?
Five dates matter for most small corporations, and only some follow the fiscal year. For a December 31, 2026 year-end:
| What | CRA rule | December 31, 2026 year-end |
|---|---|---|
| Corporate tax balance | Two months after year-end | February 28, 2027 |
| Corporate tax balance, qualifying CCPC | Three months after year-end | March 31, 2027 |
| T4 and T5 slips, with their summaries | Final day of the February following the calendar year; next business day if it is a weekend | March 1, 2027 |
| Annual GST return and payment, corporation | Three months after fiscal year-end | March 31, 2027 |
| T2 corporation income tax return | Six months after year-end; for a month-end year, the close of the sixth month | June 30, 2027 |
The three-month payment date needs all of the following: the company was a Canadian-controlled private corporation all year, it claimed the small business deduction this year or last, and its taxable income last year stayed within its business limit (for associated companies, the combined figures). Your CPA confirms whether you qualify. Plan for the earlier date until they do.
With a different fiscal year-end, slide the corporate dates along. The T4 and T5 dates stay fixed to the calendar year.
What should you do eight weeks before year-end?
Get every account reconciled to date and a profit estimate in front of your CPA. Without a picture of the year so far, every later decision is a guess.
- Confirm the fiscal year-end of every company you own. An OpCo, a PREC and a HoldCo can each close on a different date.
- Reconcile every bank account, card, line of credit and processor through the latest month-end.
- Pull a profit-to-date report and an estimate to year-end, and send both to your CPA.
- Book a call with the CPA about owner pay, bonuses and any planned equipment or vehicle purchase. Those are their calls; they need the numbers in November, not March.
- Note any new loan, lease, account or company opened during the year.
What paperwork should you chase six weeks before year-end?
Receipts, loan statements and anything that explains money moving between you and the company. Missing paper is the usual reason a year-end runs late, so clear it while the year is still open.
- List unmatched card charges and deposits, and chase the receipts or explanations.
- Gather statements for every loan and lease, showing interest separately from principal.
- Bring the vehicle log up to date if a vehicle is used for the business.
- Build a list of assets bought or sold this year, with invoices and bills of sale.
- Reconcile the shareholder loan account: personal costs paid by the company, business costs paid personally, and money moved either way.
- Agree any balance between related companies, so the OpCo's receivable matches the HoldCo's payable to the dollar.
Which payroll and sales tax checks belong a month before year-end?
Payroll agreed to remittances, slip details confirmed and GST agreed to the ledger. Slips are due in February, but the details behind them are easiest to fix before the last pay run.
- Agree year-to-date payroll to the source deductions remitted to the CRA.
- Check each employee's legal name, SIN and mailing address for the T4.
- Ask your CPA whether any taxable benefit, such as personal use of a company vehicle, belongs in the final pay run.
- Collect the legal name, SIN and address of any shareholder who may receive a dividend, for the T5.
- Agree GST filed to date with the ledger. Annual filers: estimate the year's balance so March 31 holds no surprise.
- If you file PST, check that PST was self-assessed on taxable items bought without it.
Payroll management clients have most of this handled at each pay run. Online sellers who aren't registered for GST yet should also check the running quarterly total against the $30,000 test, covered in when a home-based or online business needs to register for GST.
How do you handle the year-end cut-off in the last two weeks?
Make sure each sale, cost and payment lands in the right year. Cut-off errors are small one by one, and they add up fast.
- Invoice December's work in December, and note any work finished but not yet billed.
- Run the last pay of the calendar year, including any bonus your CPA recommended.
- Count inventory on the last day, if you hold stock: sheets signed, photos taken, cost per item noted.
- Record the vehicle odometer on the last day.
- Don't move money between companies or to yourself in the last week without a short written note of what it is.
What happens in the first six weeks after year-end?
The books are finished to the last day and the file goes to the CPA early enough to know the tax before it's due.
- Statements to the year-end date for every account, loan and processor, as soon as they're issued.
- Final reconciliations and adjustments: accruals, prepaid expenses, deferred revenue, each with a note.
- T4 and T5 slips prepared in January and February from the payroll and dividend records.
- The handover file: trial balance, general ledger, schedules for every balance-sheet account, and your answers to open questions.
- A tax estimate from the CPA, then payment by the balance-due day.
- A lock date in the ledger once the CPA's adjustments are posted, so the filed year can't drift.
That is the scope of year-end preparation. Twelve closed months from monthly bookkeeping make most of it routine.
What extra lines does a PREC need?
A PREC's year-end turns on commissions: every deal on the brokerage's statements, tied to what reached the PREC's bank account. Under the BCFSA PREC guidelines, the brokerage pays the PREC rather than the agent personally, so the PREC's ledger should show every deal.
- A commission register for the year: address, closing date, gross, split, fees, GST, net
- Every brokerage commission statement for the year, matched to its deposit
- Deals that firmed or closed in December but paid in January, listed for the CPA, who decides when they count
- GST charged on commissions agreed to the GST returns filed
- Personal spending from the PREC account flagged and coded to the shareholder loan
- Owner pay recorded as the CPA directed, salary through payroll for a T4 or dividends for a T5
- No trust money in the PREC's books: deposits held in trust belong to the brokerage under BCFSA's trust account guidelines
More on running these books through the year is in bookkeeping for a PREC in BC.
What extra lines does a rental HoldCo need?
A HoldCo with Coquitlam rental condos needs each unit's year laid out on its own, plus clean balances with the OpCo and the shareholders.
- A rent ledger by unit: rent charged and received, vacancies, tenant changes, deposits held
- Strata fee statements for the year, including any special levy
- Property tax notices and the mortgage lender's annual statement for each unit, with interest separated from principal
- Invoices for repairs and upgrades, flagged so the CPA can sort them under CRA's current versus capital guidance
- Loans between the HoldCo, the OpCo and the shareholders, agreed on both sides
- Dividends paid to shareholders, with the information needed for T5 slips
- Purchase agreements and deposit receipts for any presale held in the company; how it's taxed is the CPA's call
- A note of who handles the annual speculation and vacancy tax declaration, since Coquitlam is a taxable area
For the month-to-month side of this, see rental property bookkeeping for Coquitlam condo owners.
How long do you keep year-end records?
Generally six years, counted from the close of the last tax year the records support, and a corporation's tax year is its fiscal period. Some records are kept longer:
- Documents about buying or selling long-term property, such as a rental condo, and the share registry: kept indefinitely
- Records behind a return filed late: six years from the date that return was filed
Keep the CPA's final adjusting entries and the handover file with the year they belong to. Next year's checklist starts from them.
Starting late?
If the year-end is weeks away and several months were never reconciled, close the oldest month first. The cost of bookkeeping in Coquitlam explains how a catch-up project is priced, and the Coquitlam owner-operator's guide to bookkeeping shows where year-end sits in the rest of the year.
Questions owners ask
When is the T2 due for a corporation with a December 31 year-end?
June 30. For a year that closes at month-end, the T2 is due at the close of the sixth month that follows. Any tax owing is due well before that, at the end of February or, for a CCPC that meets the conditions, the end of March.
Do T4 and T5 slips follow my fiscal year-end?
No. Both report January to December and must be filed by the final day of the following February, whatever your fiscal year-end. In 2027 that day is a Sunday, so the CRA's next-business-day rule moves it to Monday, March 1.
Who decides whether I take salary or dividends from my corporation?
You do, on your CPA's advice. The bookkeeping side is having year-to-date profit ready early enough for that conversation, then running payroll for a salary or keeping the records behind a dividend so the right slip goes out.
How long do I keep the year-end paperwork?
Generally six years, counted from the close of the last tax year the records support. Records about buying or selling long-term property, and the share registry, are kept indefinitely.
Does my rental HoldCo need a separate year-end file from my operating company?
Yes. Each corporation has its own ledger, its own T2 and its own handover file, and any balance owed between the two companies has to agree in both sets of records.
What if the books are months behind and year-end is close?
Start with the oldest open month and work forward, because the year-end figures rest on every month before them. If the gap is large, a catch-up project comes first and the year-end file follows.