What your accountant actually needs from you at year-end

Your accountant does not want a shoebox, a shared drive folder called "2025 stuff", or read-only access to your bank. They want a small number of specific things, in a form they can tie together.

Why the package matters more than the deadline

An accountant billing at professional rates to sort your receipts is the most expensive bookkeeping you will ever buy. It's the same work a bookkeeper does, by someone whose time costs several times more, in the two weeks of the year they're busiest.

The second cost is less obvious. When a file arrives incomplete the accountant has to make assumptions, and every assumption puts the return a little further from what actually happened. So the goal below isn't tidiness — it's that every number can be traced to a document.

What everyone needs, incorporated or not

Bank and credit card statements for the full fiscal year — reconciled

Every account the business used, including the credit card you "only used a couple of times" and the payment processor that settles in batches. Twelve months, first day to last day of the fiscal year, in PDF.

Reconciled means the closing balance in your books equals the closing balance on the statement, with any difference itemised. An unreconciled bank account isn't a style choice; it means nobody can say whether the revenue figure is right. If yours won't reconcile, the signs your books are wrong covers the usual culprits.

Your GST/HST returns, reconciled to your GST/HST accounts

Send copies of every GST/HST return you filed during the fiscal year, plus proof of what you paid or received. Then reconcile them: GST/HST collected on the returns should tie to the tax collected account, input tax credits claimed should tie to the ITC account, and the payable account should clear to zero — or to a known, explainable balance — after each filing. This is the reconciliation most small business files are missing, and a payable account that never clears usually means the filing entries were never posted, or something was filed the books don't agree with.

Check too that your ITCs are supportable. CRA's documentation requirements scale with purchase size, in three tiers that start at $100 and again at $500, and they were raised from $30 and $150 in April 2021 — so much of the published guidance still repeats the old figures. The full tier-by-tier list of what each receipt has to show is set out in the twelve signs your books are wrong.

Payroll: T4s, PD7As and the clearing accounts

Three pieces, and they have to agree with each other:

• The T4 slips and T4 Summary you filed, due the last day of February following the calendar year. This is a calendar-year obligation, so it doesn't move with a non-calendar fiscal year-end.
• Every PD7A remittance statement for the year — CRA's own record of what it received and when, and the outside evidence your payroll numbers get checked against.
• The payroll clearing and liability accounts, reconciled. Wages payable, source deductions payable, and the CPP, CPP2 and EI accounts should agree to the PD7As and to the T4 Summary. If they don't, something was either remitted and not recorded, or recorded and not remitted.

If you filed more than five information returns for the year, CRA's wording is that you must file them electronically to avoid a penalty. Late T4s carry a legislated penalty with a $100 minimum, running from $10 a day to a maximum of $1,000 for one to fifty slips — though CRA applies a reduced policy where it produces a lower amount, a flat $100 for one to five slips.

Sources: CRA input tax credit documentation requirements (updated 2024-11-19); RC4120 Employers' Guide to filing the T4 slip and summary (2026-01-06). Deadlines and remitter types are on our payroll remittance due dates page.

Asset purchases and disposals, with the invoices

Anything bought that lasts — a vehicle, a laptop, equipment, leasehold improvements — plus anything sold, traded or scrapped. Your accountant needs the invoice, not the bank line, because the invoice shows the date, the GST/HST and what was included. Capital cost allowance classes are their job; getting them the documents is yours.

Home office and vehicle records

For business use of home: total home costs for the year — heat, electricity, home insurance, cleaning materials, property taxes, mortgage interest — and the square footage or room count behind your business-use percentage. The deduction can't exceed your net income from the business before deducting these expenses, so it can't create or increase a loss, and any unused amount carries forward. Detail on our home office deduction page.

For vehicles, CRA wants a logbook recording, for each trip, the date, destination, purpose and number of kilometres, plus odometer readings at the start and end of the fiscal period and on any purchase, sale or trade. Keep a full logbook for a complete twelve-month base year; after that a three-month sample can be used to extrapolate, as long as the usage is within 10% of the base year result and the base year remains representative.

Inventory count

If you hold stock, count it on the last day of the fiscal year and write down what you counted and what it cost. Not an estimate, not last year's figure adjusted. Closing inventory feeds straight into cost of goods sold, so a guess there is a guess in your gross profit and your taxable income.

Meals kept in their own account

Meals and entertainment are deductible at 50% of the lesser of the amount incurred or an amount reasonable in the circumstances, so they need their own account or the adjustment gets missed at year-end. There are 100% exceptions — including up to six employee events a year where all employees at a location are invited. Flag anything you think might qualify rather than deciding it yourself.

Sources: CRA business-use-of-home expenses (updated 2026-08-31); motor vehicle records (2026-08-31); line 8523 meals and entertainment (2026-08-31).

Sole proprietor: the T2125 package

Your business income goes on Form T2125 as part of your personal return, so your year-end is the calendar year and the package is smaller — but the deadline split catches people every year.

• Bank and credit card statements for every account the business used, reconciled to December 31.
• A clean split between business and personal. If personal spending ran through the business account, list it — it belongs in drawings, not expenses.
• GST/HST returns filed during the year, if you're registered, reconciled to the accounts.
• Payroll package, if you have employees.
• Asset purchases and disposals with invoices.
• Home office worksheet and vehicle logbook.
• Closing inventory count.
• Any T-slips and other personal income the return needs. The T2125 is part of a personal return, not a standalone filing.
• Last year's return and, if you have it, last year's accountant's adjusting entries. Opening balances have to match the prior year-end.

One structural note, because most online advice on this is written for another country: only farmers, fishers and self-employed commission agents can use the cash method. All other self-employment income must be reported on the accrual method, and switching from cash to accrual needs written permission from your tax services office, asked for before your filing due date.

Corporation: the T2 package

Everything in the list above, plus four things that only exist because you incorporated.

• Shareholder loan account activity for the full year. Every amount you took out of the company and every amount you put in, with dates, and your explanation of what each one was. This is the single most common gap in a small corporate file.
• Dividends and management fees actually paid, with the dates, and the T5 slips if any were issued.
• The minute book and any corporate changes — shares issued, directors changed, a share transfer.
• Loan and lease agreements, including anything you signed personally for the company, plus year-end statements splitting principal and interest.

Sources: CRA 2026 tax deadlines for Canadian businesses and self-employed individuals (updated 2026-05-15); balance-due day for corporations (2026-01-21); accounting methods for sole proprietorships and partnerships (2026-08-31). Everything in one calendar: our deadlines page.

How to hand it over

One folder, named by fiscal year, with subfolders for bank, GST/HST, payroll and assets, plus a single accounting file export. Statements as PDFs, not screenshots. A short note listing anything you know is unresolved — an unidentified deposit, a supplier you couldn't find an invoice for — saves more accountant time than anything else here, because the alternative is them finding it and emailing you three weeks later. Keep the books through the year rather than assembling them in March and most of this is already done by December 31; that's what our monthly bookkeeping checklist is for.

Questions people actually ask

What does my accountant actually need from me at year-end?

Reconciled bank and credit card statements for every account the business used across the full fiscal year, the GST/HST returns you filed during the year with the GST/HST accounts reconciled to them, your payroll package if you have employees — T4s filed, PD7A remittance statements, and the payroll clearing accounts agreed — invoices for anything you bought or sold that lasts, home office and vehicle records, and a closing inventory count if you hold stock. If you're incorporated, add a full year of shareholder loan account activity and any corporate changes. Last year's return and adjusting entries matter too, because your opening balances have to match the prior year-end.

When is my return due if I'm self-employed in Canada?

If you or your spouse or common-law partner carried on a business, the return is due June 15. The balance owing is due April 30. Those are two different dates for two different things, and paying on the filing date rather than the payment date is one of the most common avoidable costs in Canadian small business. Prescribed interest runs on the unpaid balance from May 1, at 7% for both the third and fourth quarters of 2026 — nearly seven weeks of it if you pay on the June filing date. If you pay instalments, they're due March 15, June 15, September 15 and December 15.

When is a corporate T2 return due?

Six months after your fiscal year-end. The balance owing, though, is due two months after year-end. There is a three-month balance-due extension, but it applies only if the company was a Canadian-controlled private corporation throughout the year, claimed the small business deduction in the current or previous year, and its prior-year taxable income did not exceed the business limit — or for an associated group, their combined taxable incomes did not exceed their combined business limits. Assuming you qualify without checking those three conditions is expensive.

Why does my accountant keep asking about the shareholder loan account?

Because it's the account that records every movement of money between you and your corporation, and in most small company files nobody tracks it during the year. Personal spending on the company card, a transfer to cover a personal bill, money you put in to make payroll — all of it lands there. Your accountant needs a complete record of those movements with dates and explanations. What the balance means for your taxes is their call to make, not something a bookkeeper should be advising you on.

Do I need to keep a vehicle logbook, or can I estimate?

You need a logbook. CRA wants the date, destination, purpose and number of kilometres for each trip, plus odometer readings at the start and end of the fiscal period and whenever the vehicle is bought, sold or traded. Keep a full logbook for a complete twelve-month base year. After that you can use a three-month sample to extrapolate, as long as the usage is within 10% of the base year result and the base year is still representative of how you use the vehicle.

What happens if I file my T4 slips late?

The legislated penalty has a $100 minimum and is charged per day, at $10 a day up to a maximum of $1,000 where you filed between one and fifty slips, with higher tiers above that. CRA also applies a reduced administrative policy and charges whichever amount is lower, which for one to five slips is a flat $100 rather than a daily calculation. T4s are due the last day of February following the calendar year. CRA's wording on electronic filing is that if you file more than five information returns for a calendar year, you must file them electronically to avoid a penalty.