Updated Checked by the Tax-Services.ca editorial team How we check
Bookkeeping software, whether it’s QuickBooks or any other package, does one job: it turns bank and card activity into records you can hand to the CRA. It can’t decide what’s deductible, and it won’t know your business is about to cross the GST/HST line. That’s still your call, or your accountant’s. We make no claims about any product here, and prices and feature lists change too often to print.
What should bookkeeping software do for you?
Judge any package against a short list. Can it record sales and expenses by category? Does it match entries against your bank statement? Can it handle the sales tax where you live, including different rates by province? Can you export everything if you leave?
The last one matters most. The CRA accepts electronic records and publishes its own guidance on storing and backing them up. Your records have to stay readable for six years from the end of the last tax year they relate to. If a subscription lapses and your data goes with it, you have a problem.
Software doesn’t move the responsibility either. The CRA’s records guide says you’re responsible for making sure adequate records are kept even when a bookkeeper or another third party keeps them for you. An app is a third party too.
Which sales tax rates must it handle?
Rates differ by province, and a package set up for the wrong one gets every invoice wrong. Here are the combined figures our calculators use for 2026.
| Province | Tax | Rate |
|---|---|---|
| Ontario | HST | 13% |
| Nova Scotia | HST | 14% |
| New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, PEI | HST | 15% |
| Alberta, Yukon, NWT, Nunavut | GST | 5% |
| British Columbia | GST plus PST | 7% PST |
| Saskatchewan | GST plus PST | 6% PST |
| Manitoba | GST plus RST | 7% RST |
| Quebec | GST plus QST | 9.975% QST |
Two of those, Manitoba’s 7% and Quebec’s 9.975%, are still on our list to confirm against the provincial pages. Check your own province’s site before you set up tax codes. A test helps: enter a $100 sale in Ontario and you should see $13 of HST and a $113 total. The GST/HST calculator gives the same split.
What does software not fix?
Bad inputs. Feed it a personal grocery run coded as an office expense and it will happily report the wrong profit. That matters, because profit drives your tax. In Ontario, $65,000 of net income means $16,371.00 of income tax and CPP in the self-employed tax calculator. Push net income to $68,000 by leaving out $3,000 of real costs and the total goes to $17,527.40. Software can’t tell those apart. You have to code things correctly, and receipts still need the date, seller and a full description.
It also won’t warn you about instalments in a form you can act on. Once your net tax owing passes $3,000, the tax instalments calculator shows four dates, March 15, June 15, September 15 and December 15. On $6,000 expected owing, that’s $1,500 a time.
Can it run your payroll?
Some packages include payroll and some don’t, and this is where you must check the tax tables for the current year. Before you rely on any tool, test it. In Ontario, one employee paid $2,000 a month has $244.53 held back and $147.29 added by you, so $391.82 goes to the CRA. The payroll remittance calculator shows that split, and it’s an estimate, since the employee’s forms change the real numbers. Payroll rates can change, and we can’t promise these figures hold after 1 October 2026, so look at the current CRA payroll tables when you set up.
What does a one-hour test look like?
Don’t trust the demo. Take last month’s real bank statement and a handful of receipts, say fifteen or twenty, and run them through the trial. Can you match each payment to a receipt without fighting the screen? Does the report at the end land in the ballpark of what you know you earned? Does a sale with HST on it split into sales and tax the way the sales tax test above says it should?
Then try to leave. Export the month as a file and open it in a spreadsheet. If that takes a support ticket, you’ve learned what you needed to know.
How do you choose without a sales pitch?
Try it with three months of your own data before you pay for a year. Ask a bookkeeper or accountant which formats they can work with, since handing over a file they can’t open wastes everyone’s time. Read the cancellation terms. See how much support costs, and how quickly you’d get an answer during filing season.
And keep a plain spreadsheet as a fallback if your income is small. The CRA doesn’t require any particular system. If you’d rather hand the entries to a person, our self-employed and small business guide shows where bookkeeping fits among the other jobs.
Where this information comes from
Record rules and the sales tax registration limit come from Canada Revenue Agency pages, read in September 2026. Sales tax rates and tax figures come from the calculators on this site, using 2026 data with items still to be checked. This site has no link with the CRA, any government or any software maker.
Frequently asked questions
Can I keep my records only in software?
The CRA accepts electronic records and publishes guidance on storing and backing them up. Keep them readable for six years.
Does software calculate my tax for me?
It records what you enter. Tax owing depends on your net income, and coding mistakes flow straight into it.
What sales tax rate should I set up?
Your province's rate. Ontario HST is 13%, so a $100 sale should show $13 of tax and a $113 total.
Should I pick software with payroll?
Only if you have staff. Test it against a known figure, such as $391.82 to remit on a $2,000 monthly wage in Ontario.
What does bookkeeping software cost?
We couldn't confirm prices for any product, so we don't quote them. Use a free trial with your own data first.
- Self-employed taxes in Canada: income, CPP and GST
How tax works when you are self-employed in Canada: reporting income and expenses, paying both halves of CPP, instalments and when to register for GST