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Gondaliya CPA

Freight Broker Tax Experts

Tax Accountant for Freight Brokers in Ontario and Across Canada

You never take custody of the freight. You find the load, you find the truck, and what you keep is the spread between what the shipper pays you and what the carrier bills you. Nothing moves through your hands but money and paper, which makes a brokerage a margin business running on somebody else’s working capital: the carrier expects payment in days, the shipper takes weeks, and every load you book widens that gap. We build the file around that reality. Arranging carriage inside Canada is a taxable supply, so your brokerage fee carries 13% HST in Ontario, with input tax credits on what it costs to run the desk, and you must register once four consecutive calendar quarters of taxable revenue add up to more than $30,000. We settle whether your revenue line carries the whole amount billed to the shipper or only your margin, hold a doubtful-debt reserve under paragraph 20(1)(l) of the Income Tax Act while a shipper receivable is genuinely in question, and keep detention, layover and lumper charges visible instead of buried in the spread. AFFORDABLE flat fees.

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AFFORDABLE Freight Broker Tax Accountant

A freight brokerage arranges carriage. It does not haul, it takes no custody of the goods, and it issues no bill of lading — the carrier does that. That one line separates you from the carriers and the forwarders whose accounting advice keeps landing on your desk, and it decides how your numbers behave, beginning with what your revenue line is allowed to contain. What you own is a spread: the shipper’s rate less the carrier’s rate, earned by finding capacity and standing behind the booking. Because the service is arranged and consumed inside Canada, it is a taxable supply at 13% HST in Ontario, with input tax credits recoverable on the operating costs behind the desk, and the $30,000 small-supplier line, measured across four consecutive calendar quarters, is what makes registration compulsory. Nothing in the domestic picture softens that rate.

The harder problem is cash. Good trucks answer the phone for brokers who pay quickly, so the carrier is paid within a couple of days of the proof of delivery; the shipper pays you in forty-five. A brokerage carrying $400,000 a month of carrier payables against a thirty-day collection gap is funding several hundred thousand dollars of somebody else’s freight at every moment of the year, and that funding grows with the business instead of shrinking. It is why a brokerage can report a profit on the T2 and still be empty at the bank in the same quarter, and why we report margin, collection speed and the payable cycle together rather than one at a time. Some brokerages finance their receivables to close the gap.

Book the load, cover the load, get paid for the load. We keep the accounting behind the third part honest.

Gondaliya CPA team - accounting and tax services for freight brokers

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Accounting That Understands How a Freight Brokerage Actually Works

A brokerage owns no iron and holds no cargo, so the pressure lands somewhere unusual: on the distance between paying and being paid, on a revenue line whose size depends on how your contracts were written, and on the handful of documents that prove a load existed at all. Get those three right and the file holds under any question. We work with brokerages across the GTA and the rest of Ontario on margin reporting, carrier payables against shipper receivables, doubtful-debt reserves, 13% HST on domestic brokerage, and the payroll behind a desk of dispatch and sales staff.

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You Arrange It, You Do Not Haul It

A brokerage finds capacity and stands behind the booking. It takes no custody of the goods and issues no bill of lading, and that distinction drives every figure on the return, starting with what your revenue line is allowed to contain.

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Two Days Out, Forty-Five Days In

Carriers are paid in days, because that is what keeps good trucks answering. Shippers pay in weeks. At $400,000 a month of carrier payables and a thirty-day collection gap, you are permanently funding several hundred thousand dollars of freight that was never yours.

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Gross or Net Is a Question of Fact

Whether the revenue line shows everything billed to the shipper with the carrier charge as a cost, or only your margin, turns on the contract and on who carries the risk. It is a determination on the facts, and it has to be documented.

⚠

A Shipper Can Fail. The Carrier Still Bills.

Where collection is genuinely in doubt, ITA 20(1)(l) allows a reserve. ITA 20(1)(p) delivers the write-off only after recovery has failed for good. Two entries at two different moments — and a carrier invoice that survives either way.

Stay Compliant and Minimize Your Freight Brokerage Tax

For a brokerage the compliance work and the tax work are one job, because both rest on the load file. A rate confirmation, a load confirmation, a carrier invoice and a proof of delivery, matched load by load, are what stand behind the revenue you reported and the costs you deducted. We keep those moving alongside the filing calendar rather than behind it.

📋

HST at 13%, WSIB and Input Tax Credits

Arranging domestic carriage is a taxable supply, so your brokerage fee carries 13% HST in Ontario and so do the detention, layover and lumper charges you bill on. Past $30,000 of taxable revenue across four consecutive calendar quarters you have to be registered, and we keep the running total in front of you so a crossing shows up in the quarter it occurs instead of surfacing a year later. Against the tax you collect we claim input tax credits on software, office rent, phones, credit reports, professional fees and the vehicles the office runs. WSIB is registered from your first hire, payroll above $1,000,000 in a year brings Ontario Employer Health Tax into the picture, and each HST period is reconciled to the T2 before anything is filed.

✅

What CRA Expects From a Broker’s File

Compliance for a brokerage is mostly documentary. ITA 230 puts a six-year retention obligation on your books and on the paperwork standing behind them, and for a broker that means the rate confirmation, the load confirmation, the carrier invoice and the proof of delivery, matched load by load rather than sitting in four unrelated piles. Thin documentation has a cost: ITA 152(7) leaves CRA free to assess on a footing other than the one your return set out, and unsettling that assessment afterwards falls to you. We hold the payroll side to the same standard, with source deductions remitted on the PD7A and the T4 slips and a T4 Summary going in no later than the last day of February, agreeing to the remittances that were genuinely made.

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Year-End Deliverables for a Brokerage

At year-end a brokerage needs a trial balance carrying shipper receivables and carrier payables at their real ages, a doubtful-debt reserve computed account by account rather than as a round percentage, and amounts invoiced before delivery deferred under ITA 12(1)(a) with the reserve ITA 20(1)(m) allows. On top of that sits the T2 itself, with its GIFI detail on Schedules 100 and 125 and a Schedule 8 tied to the asset register covering computers, office equipment and any vehicle. Where a lender or an insurer is reviewing the business, CPA-compiled statements go out with it so the figures they read are the ones your contracts support.

Accounting & Tax Experts for Freight Brokers

Gondaliya CPA freight broker accounting expertsGondaliya CPA freight broker tax experts
  • AFFORDABLE + Registered CPA Firm
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Why Choose Our Accounting Services for Freight Brokers?

1
🎯

Tax Planning — Margin, Timing and the Reserve

We plan around the two levers a brokerage actually has: when revenue is recognised and when a bad receivable becomes deductible. That means deferring amounts invoiced ahead of delivery under ITA 12(1)(a) and claiming the reserve ITA 20(1)(m) provides, holding the ITA 20(1)(l) doubtful-debt reserve where collection is genuinely in question, and keeping active profit inside the $500,000 small business limit, where Ontario’s combined rate sits near 12.2%.

2
💳

Consulting — Load-Level Margin and the Cash Gap

Our bookkeeping costs each load with its own carrier charge and its own accessorials, so detention, layover and lumper amounts appear as revenue when billed and as cost when incurred instead of vanishing into the spread. We report days to collect beside days to pay every month, because that distance is what your growth is funded out of.

3
🛡

CRA Representation — Records and Reassessments

When a review lands on your revenue treatment, your reserve or your accessorial billing, we assemble the load files that stand behind the return, file the objection where an assessment does not match those records, and apply for relief on Form RC4288 where penalties followed somebody else’s error rather than yours.

4
🏢

Bookkeeping — Payroll, Slips and Succession

We run payroll for dispatch and sales staff, treat commissions paid to employees as the payroll they are, remit on the PD7A and match the T4 Summary back to those remittances before the February deadline. We also model the profit level at which incorporating pays, and plan the eventual sale of the shares.

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Freight Broker Clients
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Freight Broker Tax and Accounting Services in Ontario

📄

Corporate Tax Filing (T2) for Freight Brokers

T2 preparation with the GIFI detail on Schedules 100 and 125, a revenue line matching what your shipper contracts actually say, amounts invoiced ahead of delivery deferred under ITA 12(1)(a), and Schedule 8 depreciation.

💳

Bookkeeping & Accounting for Freight Brokers

Load-level bookkeeping in QuickBooks Online or Xero: shipper rate, carrier rate and spread on every load, accessorials on their own lines, and receivables aged beside payables at each month end.

💵

Payroll Services for Freight Brokers

T4 payroll for dispatch and sales staff, commissions treated as payroll, PD7A remittances on their dates, the T4 Summary agreed to those remittances at February’s close, and WSIB from your first hire.

🧾

GST/HST Filing for Freight Brokers

Returns covering 13% HST on domestic brokerage and the accessorials billed with it, input tax credits on operating costs, and the $30,000 four-quarter registration line tracked continuously.

📈

Tax Planning for Freight Brokers

Planning across reserve timing, active profit kept below the $500,000 small business limit at about 12.2% combined, compensation set against the 53.53% top personal rate, and a share sale planned years ahead.

⏳

Corporate Catch-Up Filing for Freight Brokers

Unfiled T2 and HST years rebuilt from rate confirmations, carrier invoices and proofs of delivery, filed oldest first, with relief sought on Form RC4288 where the charges were not your doing.

🛡

CRA Audit Resolution for Freight Brokers

Full CRA representation on revenue treatment, reserves and accessorial billing, with the load file assembled load by load and an objection filed where an assessment does not match the records.

📊

CPA Financial Statements (Notice to Reader) for Freight Brokers

Compilation engagement statements showing receivables and payables at their real ages and the doubtful-debt reserve account by account, ready for a lender or an insurer reviewing the business.

🏢

Incorporation Services for Freight Brokers

NUANS search, articles, share structure and organising records, plus the section 85 rollover on Form T2057 where an existing unincorporated brokerage is being brought in.

📒

Catch-Up Bookkeeping Services for Freight Brokers

We rebuild months of missing load, carrier and banking records so your brokerage books are current, your receivables are aged correctly and your next filing has something behind it.

🌐

US Corporation & LLC Tax Filing for Freight Brokers

Cross-border filing for brokerages that have set up a US entity, covering US corporation and LLC returns, the treaty position that fits your presence, and state-level obligations.

📜

Voluntary Disclosure Program for Freight Brokers

A disclosure filed on Form RC199 to correct unreported brokerage fees, HST never charged on domestic loads or years never filed, while the submission is still voluntary.

Accounting & Tax Services Tailored for Freight Brokers

Practitioner-level CPA work for domestic freight brokerages and logistics intermediaries across Ontario — built around margin reporting, the distance between carrier payables and shipper receivables, and the load documents that have to stand behind both.

  • We file your T2 with the GIFI detail on Schedules 100 and 125 and a revenue line that matches how your shipper contracts actually read, because a brokerage reporting the wrong figure invites questions the ledger alone cannot answer.
  • We settle and document whether you report as principal on the whole amount billed or as agent on the margin alone, since that test turns on the contract and on who carries the risk of the load itself.
  • We defer amounts invoiced before a load is delivered under ITA 12(1)(a) and claim the reserve ITA 20(1)(m) allows, so revenue lands in the year the freight moved; one brokerage moved $86,000 into the right year.
  • We claim capital cost allowance on Schedule 8 across Class 50 computers at 55%, Class 8 office equipment at 20% and any vehicle in Class 10 at 30%, which on one file produced $7,400 of depreciation nobody had claimed.
  • We reconcile every HST period to the T2 before filing, so the revenue reported for income tax and the revenue reported for the 13% tax agree on the page; one brokerage cleared a $14,000 discrepancy that way.
  • We post every load as its own record carrying the shipper rate, the carrier rate and the spread between them, so margin is visible load by load rather than arriving monthly as a single figure nobody can take apart.
  • We keep detention, layover and lumper charges on their own lines, revenue when billed on and cost when incurred, because netting them into the spread hides which loads lost money; one cleanup exposed $23,000 of unbilled accessorials.
  • We age shipper receivables and carrier payables beside each other every month and report days to collect against days to pay, because that distance is the number your growth is actually being financed out of.
  • We match the carrier invoice to the rate confirmation and the proof of delivery before it is paid, which on one brokerage caught $11,600 of duplicated and over-billed carrier charges inside a single quarter.
  • We run QuickBooks Online or Xero beside your booking system rather than instead of it, so the load list and the ledger carry the same loads at the same amounts when the month closes.
  • We put dispatch and sales staff on T4 payroll, we withhold at source and remit on the PD7A, and we agree every slip and the T4 Summary to those remittances before the February filing date arrives.
  • We treat sales commissions paid to employees as the payroll they are rather than as something sitting outside it, so withholding and deduction both land properly; one brokerage corrected $61,000 of commissions booked the wrong way.
  • We register WSIB from your first hire rather than from the first time somebody asks, and we watch the Ontario Employer Health Tax line, which starts to bite above $1,000,000 of payroll in a calendar year.
  • We keep remittances on their due dates because the late-remittance penalty is graduated and climbs, reaching 10% at the top of the scale; getting one file current removed a recurring charge worth $4,800 a year.
  • We separate owner compensation from staff payroll, so the T4 you draw as a shareholder is planned against the dividend you draw instead of being whatever the operating account happened to allow that month.
  • Arranging domestic carriage is a taxable supply, so we charge and report 13% HST in Ontario on your brokerage fee and on the accessorial amounts billed with it, with nothing on the invoice quietly treated as outside the tax.
  • We track taxable revenue against the $30,000 line measured across four consecutive calendar quarters, so you register in the quarter you cross it rather than discovering it a year later in the middle of a cleanup.
  • We claim input tax credits on software, rent, phones, credit reports, professional fees and vehicle costs, which on one brokerage recovered $9,300 of tax that had simply never been claimed on any return.
  • We file on the frequency CRA assigns you and reconcile each period to the ledger before it goes out, so the return agrees with the revenue you will report on the T2 rather than contradicting it months later.
  • We correct periods already filed where accessorials went out without tax or credits were claimed on costs that were not business costs, because a voluntary correction costs far less than the same adjustment found later.
  • We hold active profit under the $500,000 small business limit, where the combined Ontario rate runs near 12.2%, because a brokerage reporting the whole billed amount rather than the margin reads very differently against that ceiling.
  • We time the ITA 20(1)(l) doubtful-debt reserve and the ITA 20(1)(p) write-off as two separate decisions in two separate years, which on one file pulled $48,000 of deduction into the year where it actually belonged.
  • We plan compensation against the 53.53% top personal rate in Ontario, splitting salary and dividends so the money you genuinely need reaches you at the lowest combined cost rather than by default at year-end.
  • We plan a share sale early enough that the $1.25M lifetime capital gains exemption under ITA 110.6 is available when you want it, instead of finding the conditions unmet in the month a buyer finally appears.
  • We treat the payable cycle as a tax question too, because paying carriers faster than you collect changes when deductions land and can leave you with a taxable profit and no cash standing behind it.
  • We rebuild unfiled years from the load records themselves — rate confirmations, carrier invoices and proofs of delivery — rather than from bank deposits, so the revenue figure can be supported line by line.
  • We file the oldest outstanding T2 first so arrears stop compounding on the largest balance, working in order rather than filing whichever year happens to be easiest to assemble from what survived.
  • We reconstruct the HST periods alongside the T2 years, because a brokerage that stopped filing one usually stopped filing both; one catch-up covered four years and $118,000 of previously unreported brokerage fees.
  • We apply for relief on Form RC4288 where penalties and interest followed a prior adviser’s error or circumstances outside your control, which on one brokerage file removed $7,900 of accumulated charges.
  • We build the bookkeeping as we go, so the catch-up ends with a system that stays current rather than a tidy set of old years followed by exactly the same drift.
  • We assemble the load file a review asks for: the rate confirmation, the load confirmation, the carrier invoice and the proof of delivery, matched load by load rather than handed over as four unrelated stacks of paper.
  • ITA 230 holds you to those records for a full six years, and we keep them in a shape that can be handed over on request, because most of what a review costs is the cost of reassembling what was never filed properly.
  • ITA 152(7) means a filed return is not the last word: an assessment can be raised on another footing where the load documents do not carry the figures, and overturning it is then your burden. We build the support that carries it.
  • We answer the revenue question with documents, showing which contracts put the whole billed amount on your books and which leave only the margin, so the treatment is evidenced rather than argued in the abstract.
  • We file the objection where an assessment is wrong and seek relief on Form RC4288 where the charges arose from something other than your own choices; one brokerage had $16,200 of penalties and interest cancelled.
  • We prepare compilation engagement statements carrying shipper receivables and carrier payables at their real ages, so a reader sees the working-capital gap instead of one net figure that conceals it entirely.
  • We present the doubtful-debt reserve account by account rather than as a round percentage of receivables, because whoever lends against your book wants to know which shippers are the ones in question.
  • We show the revenue line on the basis your contracts support, since the figure a reader prices a renewal against is the one printed on the statement rather than the one offered in conversation.
  • We tie the statements to the T2 and the HST returns so all three tell one story, which on one brokerage removed a financing condition the lender had been pricing at $6,000 a year.
  • We turn the statements around inside a working week once your records are complete, because a lender or an insurer who asks for them rarely gives a brokerage a full month to produce them.
  • We work out whether incorporating pays at your profit level before anything is filed, weighing an Ontario combined rate near 12.2% below the $500,000 small business limit against a 53.53% top personal rate.
  • We complete the incorporation itself — NUANS search, articles, share structure and the organising records — with a share structure that leaves room for the exemption and for a future buyer.
  • We roll an existing unincorporated brokerage in under section 85 on Form T2057, electing amounts that defer the gain on your book of shipper relationships rather than triggering it on the way through the door.
  • We set the opening balance sheet up so shipper receivables and carrier payables transfer cleanly, because a brokerage incorporating mid-year almost always has more of both outstanding than anyone expected.
  • We register the payroll, HST and corporate accounts together and file the first short-year T2 on time, which on one new brokerage avoided $3,200 of penalties on a filing that was nearly missed entirely.
  • We rebuild months of missing records load by load from rate confirmations, carrier invoices and proofs of delivery, so what comes out is a file you can hand to a lender rather than a reconstructed guess.
  • We re-age every shipper receivable and carrier payable as at each month end, which on one brokerage surfaced $31,000 of completed loads that had never been invoiced to the shipper at all.
  • We separate detention, layover and lumper amounts back out of the revenue line where they had been netted, so margin by lane is visible again the moment the catch-up work is finished.
  • We reconcile the bank against the load list rather than against the deposits, because a brokerage receives money in batches that bear no tidy relationship to the loads that generated them.
  • We finish by setting a monthly close so the same gap cannot reopen, handing you a short checklist and a working system instead of a box of carefully restored history.
  • We file the US corporation and LLC returns a brokerage picks up once it sets up south of the border, and we make certain the Canadian and US returns describe one brokerage income rather than two different ones.
  • We treat an LLC the way Canada treats it rather than the way its US paperwork reads, because the mismatch between the two systems is where brokers most often finish up taxed twice on a single margin.
  • We take the Canada-United States treaty position that fits your actual presence, so profit is reported where the work is genuinely done instead of being claimed in both places and defended properly in neither.
  • We line the US filing calendar up with your T2 so credits claimed in one country match tax actually paid in the other, which on one brokerage recovered $12,800 of double-counted tax.
  • We handle the state-level obligations that follow from holding a US entity, and we tell you plainly where a structure is costing more in compliance work than it will ever save you in tax.
  • We lodge the Voluntary Disclosures Program submission on Form RC199 while you still can, because the relief exists only for a disclosure that is genuinely voluntary and closes off the moment a review opens.
  • We confirm the disclosure is complete and reaches a year at least one year past due, since an incomplete submission can be turned away and leaves you worse placed than before you ever filed it.
  • We disclose brokerage fees that never reached a return and HST never charged on domestic loads, reconciling the shortfall load by load; one brokerage regularised $142,000 of unreported margin this way.
  • We fold the payroll side into the same submission where dispatch or sales wages went out without withholding, so the correction is complete rather than inviting a second look at years just accepted.
  • We present the disclosure with its supporting load documents attached, because a submission arriving with its own evidence is resolved on the numbers; one file closed with $21,400 of penalties relieved.

Freight Broker Margin & Cash-Gap Check

Six questions on your revenue basis, the distance between paying carriers and collecting from shippers, accessorial reporting, the doubtful-debt reserve, your load records and whether it is time to incorporate. No fee shown.

1. Does your revenue line report the basis your shipper contracts actually support, rather than whatever the software produced?

2. Do you know your days to collect from shippers against your days to pay carriers for this month?

3. Are detention, layover and lumper charges reported on their own lines rather than netted into the margin?

4. Is there a doubtful-debt reserve on the books where a shipper receivable is genuinely in question?

5. Can you produce the rate confirmation, carrier invoice and proof of delivery for any load from the last six years?

6. Is your freight brokerage incorporated?

Free CPA Consultation for Freight Brokers

Case Studies: Freight Broker Accounting & Tax

Cambridge Freight Brokerage — The Gap Nobody Had Measured

The problem: A Cambridge brokerage booking roughly $400,000 a month of carrier charges paid its carriers on two-day terms and collected from shippers on forty-five. The T2 showed a profit every year while the operating account ran empty every month, and nobody could say how much of its own cash sat permanently tied up in delivered freight.

What we did: We aged shipper receivables and carrier payables beside each other each month end, reported days to collect against days to pay, and rebuilt the close so both numbers arrived together. Amounts invoiced ahead of delivery moved into the year the freight ran, under ITA 12(1)(a) with the reserve ITA 20(1)(m) allows.

The result:

  • Several hundred thousand dollars identified as permanently funded
  • $86,000 of revenue landed in the year the freight ran
  • Collection cycle shortened by eleven days across two quarters

Woodstock Freight Brokerage — A Shipper Failed, the Carriers Still Billed

The problem: A Woodstock brokerage lost a produce shipper owing $74,000 across nineteen delivered loads. The carriers had been paid within days and their invoices were never in question. The previous bookkeeping wrote the whole amount off in one entry in one year, claiming a deduction the records could not yet support.

What we did: We separated the two events the rules keep apart: a reserve under ITA 20(1)(l) for the year collection was genuinely in doubt, and an ITA 20(1)(p) deduction taken account by account only as recovery failed. Support was rebuilt from the rate confirmations, carrier invoices and proofs of delivery.

The result:

  • $74,000 of bad debt deducted in the correct years
  • Reserve and write-off documented as two separate entries
  • $9,600 of exposure removed from an earlier filed year

Belleville Freight Brokerage — Accessorials Buried in the Spread

The problem: A Belleville brokerage billed detention, layover and lumper charges to shippers and absorbed the matching costs, then posted both to a single revenue line. Monthly margin looked steady, but nobody could tell which lanes were carrying the accessorials and which were quietly losing money on them, and load paperwork lived in three separate places.

What we did: We split accessorial revenue and accessorial cost onto their own lines, costed every load with its own carrier charge, and built one load file holding the rate confirmation, the load confirmation, the carrier invoice and the proof of delivery together for the whole six-year period ITA 230 sets.

The result:

  • Margin visible on every load and every lane
  • Accessorials revenue when billed, cost when incurred
  • Load records retrievable from one place for the full period

Our Simple Process

How We Work With Freight Brokers

Know Exact Fees within 2 Minutes NOW

Our clear, efficient process ensures every step is transparent, building trust and long-term client relationships.

Here’s a simplified process approach:
Step 1

Kickoff (Document Request)

Collect prior T2 and HST returns, the shipper contracts and rate agreements, a month of rate confirmations, carrier invoices and proofs of delivery, the receivable and payable ageings, payroll records and bank statements.

Step 2

First 30 Days (Cleanup & Setup)

Set up QuickBooks Online or Xero beside your booking system, build the revenue basis your contracts support, separate accessorial revenue from accessorial cost, and configure payroll, WSIB and the HST filing calendar.

Step 3

Monthly Close

Monthly reconciliations, margin by load, shipper receivables aged beside carrier payables, days to collect reported against days to pay, and 13% HST on domestic brokerage with input tax credits claimed.

Step 4

Quarterly Planning Review

Compensation mix, the doubtful-debt reserve reviewed account by account, the revenue line checked against the small business limit, and the cash position sitting behind the reported profit.

Step 5

Year-End Close & T2 Filing

Trial balance, statements showing receivables and payables at their real ages, revenue deferred under ITA 12(1)(a), Schedule 8 depreciation, and the T2 with GIFI filed on time.

Get Your Freight Brokerage Taxes Done Right Today

Transparent Pricing for Freight Brokers

Affordable Pricing for Freight Brokers

Know Exact Fees within 2 Minutes NOW

We believe in clear, upfront pricing so you know exactly what to expect. All fees include HST.

  • Tax Preparation (Corporation) — From $400
  • Tax Return Filing (Corporation) — From $400
  • Tax Compliance Audit — FREE CRA audit support for our clients
  • Tax Strategy — FREE for our clients
  • Accounting Base Plan — From $100 per month
  • Bookkeeping Management — Free for our Accounting clients
  • Financial Reporting — Free for our Accounting clients
  • Business Formation — Flat $35
  • Incorporation Process — Flat $35
  • Entity Setup Assistance — Flat $35
  • Full-Service Payroll — From $125 per month

Payment is by Interac e-Transfer to info@gondaliyacpa.ca only. Security question: Not Applicable, as auto-deposit is enabled.

Meet Your Lead Freight Broker Accountant

Meet your lead freight broker accountant. The same two people handle your brokerage every year, from the monthly margin reporting through to the T2.

Sharad Gondaliya CPA

Sharad Gondaliya, CPA

Principal

Bio

647-212-9559
sharad@gondaliyacpa.ca

Vandana Goel CPA

Vandana Goel, CPA

Accounting Specialist

Bio

647-250-0242
vandana@gondaliyacpa.ca

What Our Clients Say

1300+ five-star reviews from freight brokerage, logistics and transportation business owners across Ontario and Canada.

Serving Freight Brokers Across Ontario

Our CPA team works with freight brokerages throughout Ontario. We understand how a margin business funded by somebody else’s working capital actually behaves: what the revenue line is allowed to contain, how quickly carriers have to be paid against how slowly shippers pay, when a shipper receivable becomes a reserve and when it becomes a deduction, and which load documents have to stand behind all of it.

Toronto (ON)

55 Queen St E Ste 1205, Toronto, ON M5C 1R6, Canada

+1 (647) 212-9559

9:00 AM – 8:30 PM (Mon – Sun)

Mississauga (ON)

5373 Bullrush Dr, Mississauga, ON, Canada

+1 (647) 212-9559

9:00 AM – 8:30 PM (Mon – Sun)

Brampton (ON)

4 Starhill Crescent, Brampton, ON L6R 2P9, Canada

+1 (647) 212-9559

9:00 AM – 8:30 PM (Mon – Sun)

Scarborough (ON)

24 Clementine Square, Scarborough, ON M1G 2V7, Canada

+1 (647) 212-9559

9:00 AM – 8:30 PM (Mon – Sun)

Vaughan (ON)

19 Cabinet Crescent, Woodbridge, ON L4L 6H9, Canada

+1 (647) 212-9559

9:00 AM – 8:30 PM (Mon – Sun)

Oshawa (ON)

210 Durham St, Oshawa, ON L1J 5R3, Canada

+1 (647) 212-9559

9:00 AM – 8:30 PM (Mon – Sun)

Ottawa (ON)

2090 Neepawa Ave a314, Ottawa, ON K2A 3L6, Canada

+1 (647) 212-9559

9:00 AM – 8:30 PM (Mon – Sun)

Etobicoke (ON)

60 Stevenson Rd #1601, Etobicoke, ON M9V 2B4, Canada

+1 (647) 212-9559

9:00 AM – 8:30 PM (Mon – Sun)

Hamilton (ON)

70 Starling Dr, Hamilton, ON L9A 0C5, Canada

+1 (647) 212-9559

9:00 AM – 8:30 PM (Mon – Sun)

Guelph (ON)

1155 Gordon St, Guelph, ON N1L 1S8, Canada

+1 (647) 212-9559

9:00 AM – 8:30 PM (Mon – Sun)

Windsor (ON)

4387 Guppy Ct, Windsor, ON N9G 2N8, Canada

+1 (647) 212-9559

9:00 AM – 8:30 PM (Mon – Sun)

North York (ON)

150 Graydon Hall Dr #912, North York, ON M3A 3B2, Canada

+1 (647) 212-9559

9:00 AM – 8:30 PM (Mon – Sun)

Freight Broker Accounting & Tax FAQs

Should I incorporate my freight brokerage?
It depends on how much of the profit you leave in the business. A corporation is taxed at about 12.2% combined in Ontario on active income up to the $500,000 small business limit, against a top personal rate of 53.53%, so the saving is a deferral on money you never withdraw. For a brokerage there is a second reason: retained cash is not surplus, it is the working capital funding the gap between paying carriers and collecting from shippers. Incorporating also brings a future share sale within reach of the $1.25M lifetime capital gains exemption under ITA 110.6 where the conditions have been planned for in advance. We run your own figures both ways before you decide.
Do freight brokers charge HST?
Yes. Arranging domestic carriage is a taxable supply under the Excise Tax Act, so brokerage fees on movements inside Canada carry 13% HST in Ontario, and so do the detention, layover and lumper charges billed on the same invoice. Against that you recover input tax credits on what it costs to run the desk: software, rent, phones, credit reports, professional fees and vehicle costs. Registration stops being optional once four consecutive calendar quarters of taxable revenue exceed $30,000, and we keep the running total visible so the crossing is spotted as it occurs.
Do I report gross or net?
One or the other, and the difference is not cosmetic. Reporting the whole amount billed to the shipper with the carrier charge as a cost produces a revenue line several times larger than reporting only your margin, on identical profit. That larger figure is what a lender sees on your statements, what a bonding or insurance renewal is priced against, and how your revenue line reads against the small business limit. It has to be settled deliberately and documented, not left to whatever the accounting software happened to default to.
What decides gross versus net?
The contract and the risk. Where you contract with the shipper in your own name and stand behind the carriage yourself, you are acting as principal; where the arrangement is a disclosed agency and the carrier charge was never yours to bear, you are acting as agent and only the margin is yours. It is a determination on the facts of your own agreements, and it has to be documented in the file rather than asserted afterwards. We read the contracts, take a position, and write down the reasons for it.
When do I pay the carrier?
In practice, quickly — often within a couple of days of the proof of delivery, because fast payment is what keeps good carriers taking your loads. That is a commercial decision rather than a tax one, but it drives your accounting. Paying in two days and collecting in forty-five means every load you book takes cash out before it brings any in. We report days to pay beside days to collect every month, so the number is in front of you before the account runs dry rather than after.
What if a shipper does not pay?
Two things happen at once. The receivable stops being worth what the ledger says, and the carrier invoice for those loads stays payable in full. Where collection is genuinely in doubt, ITA 20(1)(l) allows a reserve against the receivable for that year. Where the amount can no longer be recovered at all, the deduction comes under ITA 20(1)(p). They are two entries at two different times, and collapsing them into a single write-off in a single year is the most common error we correct on a brokerage file.
Can I write off a bad debt?
Yes, but the timing has to follow the facts. The ITA 20(1)(l) reserve belongs to the year in which collection was genuinely in doubt; the ITA 20(1)(p) deduction belongs to the later year in which recovery finally failed. Keeping them distinct matters because each needs its own support — the reserve, evidence the account was in question; the deduction, evidence that recovery has failed. We compute the reserve account by account rather than as a percentage of the receivable total, because a percentage supports nothing.
Do I still owe the carrier?
Yes. A shipper who fails to pay you does not release you from the carrier invoice for the loads that were hauled. The carrier performed and holds its own paperwork, and your arrangement with the shipper is a separate matter entirely. That asymmetry is the real risk of the trade, and it is why credit work on a new shipper is worth more to a brokerage than almost any deduction. On the statements we show it as exactly what it is: a payable that outlives the receivable.
What records does CRA want?
The load, documented end to end. The six-year retention obligation in ITA 230 reaches your books and everything standing behind them, which for a brokerage means the rate confirmation, the load confirmation, the carrier invoice and the proof of delivery, matched load by load rather than kept in four separate systems. That matters because ITA 152(7) leaves CRA free to look past the figures you filed where nothing in the file stands them up, and the work of unsettling whatever comes back is yours. Complete load files are what make that work possible.
Are load confirmations enough?
On their own, no. A load confirmation shows what was agreed with the carrier. It does not show what the shipper agreed to pay, what the carrier finally invoiced, or that the freight arrived. The set has to hold together: rate confirmation, load confirmation, carrier invoice and proof of delivery, tied to one load and one pair of amounts. We build the file that way from the first booking, because reassembling it years later out of three systems and a mailbox is the expensive version.
How do I handle detention and lumper charges?
On their own lines, both sides of them. Detention, layover and lumper charges are revenue when you bill them on and a cost when you incur them, and they should never disappear invisibly into the margin. Netted, they hide which loads and which lanes are losing money on waiting time and unloading, and they make the tax harder to show as well, since the amounts you bill on carry 13% like everything else on the invoice. Separated, they are simply visible.
Do I need WSIB?
If you have employees, yes, and from the first hire rather than from the first time somebody asks. Dispatch and sales staff are employees on T4 payroll, with withholding sent in on the PD7A and the slips and the T4 Summary due at the end of February, tied to what was actually sent. Payroll above $1,000,000 in a year also brings Ontario Employer Health Tax into it. Remittance dates matter as well: the late-remittance penalty is graduated and climbs, reaching 10% at the top of the scale.
How do I pay myself?
Out of a corporation, as some mix of salary and dividends, decided against the 53.53% top personal rate in Ontario and against what the business needs to keep. For a brokerage the second half of that does most of the work, because retained profit is funding the gap between paying carriers and collecting from shippers. Salary creates RRSP room and payroll obligations; dividends create neither. We set the mix each year on your actual figures rather than on a rule of thumb.

Related Industries We Serve

Freight Forwarders

  • Revenue recognition across movement legs
  • T2 filing, GIFI and HST returns
  • Payables, receivables and bookkeeping

Specialized Haulers

  • Heavy equipment depreciation and disposals
  • Load costing and HST filing
  • Corporate tax planning and payroll

Fleet Owners

  • Vehicle depreciation pools and financing
  • Per-unit costing and HST returns
  • Corporate filing, payroll and bookkeeping

Factoring Companies

  • Fee and interest income reporting
  • Receivable portfolio accounting
  • T2 corporate returns and HST filing

Freight Broker Accounting & Tax Done Right.

T2 filing with a revenue line your shipper contracts actually support, margin reported load by load, shipper receivables aged against carrier payables, doubtful-debt reserves under ITA 20(1)(l) kept separate from write-offs under ITA 20(1)(p), 13% HST on domestic brokerage with input tax credits, detention, layover and lumper charges reported where they can be seen, and T4 payroll for dispatch and sales staff with WSIB from the first hire. AFFORDABLE flat fees, no hourly billing. Licensed CPA Ontario. 1300+ five-star reviews. 30-Day Money-Back Guarantee.



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