Читать книгу Kickstart Your Corporation - Andrew Feindel - Страница 21

Once you are incorporated, you will need to designate a fiscal year-end for your corporation. If you're looking to keep things simple, choose a corporate year-end of December 31, the same as your personal tax year-end.

There can be some advantages, however, in choosing an off-calendar year-end. For example, with an off-calendar year end of July 31 or later, you would be able to defer paying taxes for up to 179 days. This means you could declare a bonus in the company fiscal (non-calendar) year, but not actually take the money into (taxable) personal income into the following (calendar) year.

Your professional corporation will file its own return and pay its own taxes. The corporation's tax returns are due six months after your designated corporate year-end, but the final balance of any tax owing is due two to three months after your corporate year-end.² As you will now be an employee of the corporation, and no longer a self-employed individual, your personal taxes will be due by April 30—and not the deadline of June 15 granted to self-employed individuals and their spouses.

A mistake that's often made in the first year of incorporation is failing to file for dividends, recorded on T5 slips, by February 28 of the following year. This oversight will result in a late fee of the greater of $100 or $10 per day.³ February 28 (or 29 in a leap year) is also the date for filing T4 slips. You will need to keep your company records for at least seven years—including invoices, receipts, cheques, and documentation of your salaried employees' duties and hours worked.⁴