CRA Business Number – GST and Payroll Accounts for Your Alberta Business

An honest note on the price: CRA does not charge to register a business number or its program accounts, and you can register directly with CRA at no cost. What you pay us for is choosing the right accounts and settings the first time, so nothing has to be corrected later, and for sending you every number within 1–2 business days.

GST registration in Alberta: when it becomes mandatory

• The business number. The BN is CRA's identifier for your business, a nine-digit number. Program accounts attach to it: RT for GST/HST, RP for payroll, RC for corporate income tax and RM for import/export. All of them are registered with CRA, not with Alberta Corporate Registry, which is why incorporation alone does not set them up.
• When GST registration is required. Once your worldwide taxable revenues exceed $30,000 in a single calendar quarter or over four consecutive quarters, you are no longer a small supplier and must register. Below that, registration is voluntary, and registering lets you claim input tax credits, the GST you pay on business purchases. Whether that helps you is a question for your CPA; we register on the date they choose.
• Alberta has no PST. The only sales tax an Alberta business collects is the federal GST at 5%. Selling into a province with HST is a question for your CPA.
• Payroll. Open the payroll (RP) account before you pay your first employee. The payroll account covers the deductions you send to CRA; it is not the same as a WCB-Alberta account, which covers workplace injury and is opened separately with WCB-Alberta.
• Corporate tax. Every Alberta corporation files a T2 corporate tax return with CRA under its RC account, whether or not it made money. Your CPA prepares it; we make sure the account exists and the fiscal year end is right.

Who this is for

• The founder who incorporated this week and wants the CRA side finished before the first invoice goes out.
• The sole proprietor with a registered trade name who is about to pass the small-supplier threshold, or is hiring for the first time.
• The owner opening a payroll account before the first employee starts, and wondering whether WCB-Alberta is the same thing (it is not; see below).
• The professional whose accountant has chosen the fiscal year end and share structure and now needs the CRA accounts to match.

How it works

1. You fill in the online form — about 10 minutes. If we incorporated your company, the corporate details are already in your account.
2. A trained agent reviews your answers within one business day: whether a BN already exists, the GST effective date against your threshold date, and the fiscal year end against your articles and organizational resolutions.
3. You authorize us with CRA, and we register the business number and each program account you need.
4. We email you every number with its effective date and reporting period, within 1–2 business days of a complete order.
5. We tell you what CRA expects next and when, as CRA states it, so your first GST or payroll filing is not a surprise. The filing itself is your CPA's or bookkeeper's job.

ACS is a private company. We are not CRA, and we are not a government office. If a registration cannot be completed, our refund policy explains what happens.

Common mistakes we catch before filing

• Registering for GST too early or too late. The effective date should match the day you crossed the threshold or the date your CPA chose, not the day you happened to fill in a form.
• A fiscal year end that does not match the minute book. CRA, your organizational resolutions and your CPA should all show the same date.
• A reporting period that does not fit the business your CPA described, which means either filing far more often than necessary or being stuck with the wrong cycle.
• A second business number for a corporation that already had one, which takes months to untangle.
• No payroll account before the first pay, discovered when the first remittance is due.

What you need before you start

• For a corporation: the exact legal name, the incorporation date, the Alberta corporate access number and the Certificate of Incorporation. For a sole proprietor or partnership: your legal name and the trade name registration.
• The business address, mailing address and phone number.
• The names of the owners or directors and the identification CRA asks for.
• The fiscal year end your CPA chose. Do not guess this one; it is hard to change later.
• A short description of what the business does and where its customers are.
• For GST: your revenue to date, whether you have passed the small-supplier threshold, and the date you did, or your CPA's instruction to register voluntarily.
• For payroll: the date of your first pay and roughly how many people you will pay.
• Your authorization for us to deal with CRA on the business's behalf.

• Your CRA business number (BN), registered new or confirmed if your corporation already has one.
• A GST/HST account (RT), opened with the effective date, fiscal year end and reporting period your CPA chose, when registration is required or you choose to register voluntarily.
• A payroll account (RP) when you are hiring, ready before your first pay run.
• An import/export account (RM) if you bring goods into Canada.
• Confirmation of the corporate income tax account (RC) that your T2 return is filed under.
• A one-page summary of every number, its effective date and its reporting period, in PDF for your minute book and your CPA.
• A trained person who checks each choice against what you told us before anything is submitted.