Registering a business in Canada
The federal number, the tax accounts that hang off it, and the authorisation that lets your accountant deal with the CRA for you.
Somebody starting out, or an existing sole proprietor adding accounts. Incorporation itself is a separate step and is done where you incorporate.
Get a business number
One number, and every CRA account you will ever open hangs off it: payroll, GST/HST, corporate income tax, import and export. The same form opens the accounts, so most businesses fill it in once and never again.
Authorise your accountant or bookkeeper
So they can deal with the CRA on the business's behalf rather than reading you the screen over the phone. There is a matching form to cancel it, which matters the day they stop working for you.
Set up how you pay the CRA
Registering for electronic payment before the first remittance is due, and the voucher that goes with a payment on an amount owing.
Report the business's income at year end
A sole proprietor or partnership reports business income on a statement filed with their personal return rather than on a corporate one.
Worth knowing
Registering federally and registering provincially are different things and you usually need both. Which provincial registration depends on where the business operates, not where you live.
Whether you have to register for GST/HST at all depends on your revenue and what you sell, and that is a question for the CRA or your accountant. We can say which form opens the account. We cannot say whether you need it.
Fill in the copy you have
Already downloaded it? Bring that file and we'll fill it in. It works the same for a form nobody publishes: a benefits enrolment, an employer's payroll form, anything with boxes in it.