Client handbook

Welcome

Our goal is 5-Star Books: accurate, timely numbers you can use to make decisions and grow your business. This handbook explains how we work together to get there.

Great bookkeeping is a team effort. When we get your documents and answers on time, you get books you can trust and reports that make sense. Together, that keeps CRA happy and keeps you informed.

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How we communicate

We’re part of your business team now, so we’ll be in touch often.

Reply times

Quick answer

We work in focused time blocks so your books get our full attention. We strive to reply within 3 business days, during business hours: Monday to Friday, 9 am to 4 pm.

Best ways to reach us

• Questions and requests: use the comments or messages in Double, your client portal. Everything stays in one place, so nothing gets lost.
• Email: fine for a quick question or a short list of points. Emails between us are copied into your client record in our practice system, so nothing gets lost. Please keep bank statements and anything sensitive in your client portal instead (see Sharing documents).
• Meetings: book your monthly meeting or a 15-minute quick question anytime in the client scheduler. We record and transcribe our meetings so our notes are accurate, and the summary is saved to your client record. Our note-taking assistant joins the meeting as its own participant, with its own name and picture, so you can see when it’s there. Tell us if you’d rather we didn’t use it and we’ll talk it through.
• Phone: welcome when something needs a real conversation. If we can’t pick up, leave a message with the key points.

Please avoid

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Sharing documents

• Receipts and invoices: upload them to your client portal, send them to your portal’s forwarding email address, or scan them with the Double mobile app.
• Sensitive documents (tax returns, ID, articles of incorporation, payroll details): always through your client portal, never by email. Email isn’t secure enough for personal and financial information.
• Monthly reports: we share your period-end reports in your client portal. Download anything you’d like to keep.
• Custom reports and budgets: we build these with you in your accounting software.

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Your client portal

Your client portal is where you’ll find our questions, share documents and receipts, and see your monthly reports. It runs on Double, and it works in any web browser or on your phone.

Signing in

• Sign in at clients.cvbookkeeping.ca, and bookmark it so it’s always handy.
• No password to remember: ask for a magic link and it arrives in your email. You can set up a password instead if you prefer.
• For extra security, new client portals are set up with two-factor authentication (2FA) during onboarding: after you sign in, you’ll enter a code sent to your phone by text. Already a client and want it turned on? Just ask.

Help guides and videos

Double, the company behind the portal, has short guides with videos that show you how it works:

• The Client Portal (For Clients): signing in, answering our questions, and finding your reports and files. Includes videos on requesting a magic link and setting up a password.
• Receipts in the Client Portal: every way to send us receipts, and where to find the ones you’ve sent. Includes a video on uploading several receipts at once from your phone.

The mobile app

• Download the client portal app for iPhone and iPad or Android.
• Snap receipts as you go, answer our questions and get notifications, all from your phone.

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Your part: good habits

These sound simple, and they aren’t always easy. They make the biggest difference to your books.

Keep business and personal separate

• Use a business bank account and credit card for business only.
• If a personal purchase ends up on a business card, leave us a note. Only upload the receipt if it’s clearly marked personal.
• When money moves between you and the business, tell us whether it’s an owner draw, an investment or a loan.
• Plan your bills and keep transfers between accounts to a minimum.

Run everything through business accounts

• Set up online banking and e-statements for every business account. We need them to do your books.
• Avoid cash for business purchases, unless cash is a normal part of your sales.

Send the paperwork behind big transactions

• Loans, financing, and large purchases: send us the paperwork as soon as you can, so there are no year-end surprises.
• Buying or selling equipment, vehicles or other assets: let us know, so your accountant has what they need at year-end.

Track your mileage

• Use a mileage app to log each business trip (date, where, why, and kilometres) and your total kilometres for the year. Sole proprietors claim the business share of actual vehicle costs, not a per-kilometre rate. If you’re incorporated, the company can pay you a reasonable per-kilometre allowance or reimburse actual vehicle costs, but generally not both.

Contractors and new hires

• Ask contractors for proper invoices showing their business number and any sales tax and workers’ compensation registration.
• Never pay anyone off the books, and don’t accept off-the-books work from suppliers either.
• New employees: have them complete their federal and provincial TD1 forms and our new hire form on their first day (see Payroll).
• Subcontractors: have them complete a subcontractor form with their business number or SIN, so their year-end slips are right. A sole proprietor can give either their business number or their SIN.

Sales tax, payroll deductions, and CRA

Review your reports

• Look over your reports within 7 days. We’re human, and so are you, so a second set of eyes helps.
• Spot something odd? Tell us right away. Once a period is closed, we can’t go back and change it.
• Too busy to keep up? Name someone you trust as a backup contact, or talk to us about taking on more of the work.

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Receipts

What to upload

• Business expenses only. Mark anything personal clearly, or leave it out.

Digital receipts and invoices

• Send them to Double with the upload button, the mobile app or your forwarding email address. You’ll find your forwarding email address in your onboarding email, your monthly reminder emails, and your client portal.
• If it isn’t obvious what something was for, add a quick note: what, where, and why.

Worth setting up

Use your own email address for receipts. Set up something like receipts@yourbusiness.com and have it forward to the address we give you. Send and forward receipts to your own address from then on. Day to day nothing changes, but the address belongs to you: if you ever switch bookkeepers or systems, you change one forwarding rule instead of writing to every supplier you have. Refer to your email provider for instructions on setting up email forwarding.

Where they end up

• We attach each receipt and bill to the transaction it belongs to in QuickBooks Online, so the proof lives with the entry rather than in a folder somewhere.
• That is what makes a CRA review straightforward: we open the transaction and the document is already there. It is the main reason we keep asking for the ones we are missing.

Paper receipts

• Take a clear, well-lit photo with the receipt as flat as you can. Hold your phone steady.
• For long receipts, capture the business name, date, items, and sales tax. You can skip the ads at the bottom.
• Add a note if anything isn’t obvious.

Petty cash (if your business uses it)

• Treat petty cash like a small bank account.
• When you take cash out, upload the bank withdrawal receipt.
• Upload every receipt paid from petty cash and mark it “petty cash”.
• Send us the petty cash count at month-end, and we’ll reconcile it.

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Meals and gifts

Meals and entertainment

• Only meals and entertainment to earn, keep or win business count. Lunch because it’s a workday doesn’t.
• Generally, only 50% of the cost is deductible.
• Upload the itemized receipt and the card slip side by side, and write who you were with and why on the receipt (see the example under Receipts).
• Event and sporting tickets you give clients count as entertainment, so the 50% limit applies. A restaurant gift card usually gets the same treatment, so tell us what it was for and we’ll code it with your accountant’s approach in mind. Either way, there’s no GST/HST to claim on a gift card: the tax applies when it’s spent.

Client gifts

• Note who each gift was for. The tax treatment depends on who received it.

Staff gifts and awards

CRA generally treats gifts to employees as taxable, with some exceptions. Tell us what you gave, to whom and what it was worth, and we’ll check the current CRA rules before it goes through payroll.

• Non-cash gifts and awards: generally tax-free up to a combined $500 per employee per year, including taxes. Only the amount over $500 is a taxable benefit.
• Cash and near-cash gifts: always taxable benefits, reported on the employee’s T4. A gift card counts as non-cash only if it can be used at one store or a group of stores named on the card, can’t be turned into cash, and you keep a log of who got it, when, why, the type, amount and store. Other gift cards are taxable.
• Long-service awards: a separate tax-free limit of $500, for at least 5 years of service and at least 5 years since the last one. The two limits don’t pool: unused long-service room can’t be moved over to gifts and awards.
• Small items like a logo mug or t-shirt: usually not taxable.

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Your month-end timeline

We aim to finish last month’s books by the 15th. Sales tax due dates depend on how often you file and where, and we’ll tell you yours.

Every week

• Log in to QuickBooks Online or Xero to check your bank connections are working, and answer any new questions in your client portal. Tip: bookmark both.

By the 5th

• Upload last month’s bank and credit card statements and receipts, with the “who and why” on meal receipts.
• Include your petty cash balance, if you use petty cash.
• Make sure last month’s sales and invoices are complete, and bills you’ve paid are marked paid in QuickBooks Online or Xero.

Around the 15th

• We send your reports in your client portal: profit and loss, balance sheet and cash flow, plus receivables and payables when you need them.
• We also send questions about transactions we couldn’t identify, match to a receipt or find in the bank. Please answer within 10 days.

15th to 22nd

• Review your reports, and email us about anything that needs a second look.

By the 25th

• If you file your own sales tax: file and pay by your due date, then upload the confirmation and payment receipt to your client portal.
• If we file for you: we file by your due date and send you the confirmation.

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Payroll

We enter your approved hours into your payroll software and take care of routine tasks, like remittances, year-end slips and Records of Employment (ROEs). We’re not payroll specialists or HR experts, so for complicated situations, like a dismissal, a leave or an unusual pay arrangement, we recommend working with an HR professional or checking the employment standards in your jurisdiction. If you’re not sure who to call, our short guide on who to ask can help.

New employees

• Federal and provincial TD1 forms, completed on their first day.
• Our New Employee Information Form (PDF) (with a void cheque or your bank’s direct deposit form attached), or your own form with the same details.

When someone’s earnings stop

A Record of Employment (ROE) goes to Service Canada whenever someone’s earnings stop, whether they leave, go on leave, or are laid off. It has a short deadline, so tell us right away and send:

• their last day worked or paid
• the reason, for example quit, return to school, end of contract, illness, parental leave or dismissal. It decides the reason code on the ROE.

Bonuses

Planning to give someone a bonus? Tell us before you pay it, and let us know what it’s for. We’ll run it through payroll so income tax, CPP and EI come off correctly. Paying a bonus outside payroll, like by e-transfer, can leave deductions owing later.

Please tell us which type it is:

• Earned bonus: tied to hours worked, production or efficiency, set ahead of time, so the employee knew how to earn it. In Alberta, vacation pay is added on top. If it’s a sales or commission arrangement, tell us the details, because those don’t always fit neatly into either box.
• Discretionary bonus: a thank-you you decided to give, not tied to hours or targets. In Alberta, vacation pay isn’t added.

Either way, a bonus is taxable, so income tax, CPP and EI come off.

Gifts to staff

• See Meals and gifts.

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Tools we use

• Double: your secure client portal for documents, receipts, questions, and reports. Emails with us are linked here too.
• QuickBooks Online or Xero: where your books live.
• Moxie: onboarding, your agreement, and booking meetings.
• Microsoft 365: our email, plus Microsoft Teams for video meetings.
• Payroll: Wagepoint, Payworks, Jane Payroll, or ADP, depending on your setup.
• Payments: Square, Stripe, Moneris, PayPal, QuickBooks Payments, or Jane Payments, matched to your bank every month.
• Bill pay: a secure payment platform like Plooto, if bill pay is part of your plan. We set the payments up and you approve them, and more than one person can approve where you need that.

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How we keep your information safe

• We never do client work from public places like coffee shops or libraries.
• We don’t email documents. We share them through your client portal and let you know when they’re ready.
• We never ask for or store your online banking login. If your bank offers a read-only user, you can set one up for us. When a bank connection is needed, you enter your own details while we guide you.
• New client portals are set up with two-factor authentication (2FA) during onboarding, and we can turn it on for existing clients on request.
• We use two-factor sign-in on every accounting app that offers it, and on our email, website, and domain accounts. We recommend you do too.
• Our passwords are kept in a secure password manager.
• We carry errors and omissions insurance and cyber insurance.

General information based on CRA rules as of September 2026. Limits and rates change, so we check the current rules before anything goes through your books or payroll. This isn’t tax advice, and your accountant decides how anything is treated on your return.