The rate on the invoice is set at the delivery address
A household or office move is a freight transportation service in GST/HST law, and the place-of-supply rule for freight is blunt: the rate follows the destination of the goods. A move from Mississauga to Ottawa is an Ontario supply at 13% HST. The same crew, the same truck and the same tariff delivered to Calgary is a 5% GST supply, because Alberta is where the shipment lands. Charge 13% on that job and you have overcharged the customer; charge 5% on an Ontario delivery and the shortfall is yours at the next HST review.
What you supply alongside the move usually follows it. Packing, loading and storage-in-transit provided by you as the carrier, as part of one continuous movement, form part of the freight service and take its rate. Stand-alone monthly storage is a different supply altogether, taxed at 13% because the goods sit in your Ontario warehouse, whatever province they came from or leave for. A move delivered to a destination outside Canada is generally zero-rated, a flag worth confirming file by file rather than assuming.
| What you billed | Tax on your invoice |
|---|---|
| Move within Ontario, packing included | 13% HST, one rate on the whole job |
| Move delivered to another province | That province's GST or HST rate, set by destination |
| Linehaul run for the carrier who bills the shipper | Zero-rated as an interline settlement |
| Monthly storage in your Ontario warehouse | 13% HST, wherever the goods are headed next |
| Boxes and supplies sold on their own | 13% HST as an Ontario sale of goods |
Interlining: only one carrier charges the customer
Long moves are often two companies: you sell the job, pack and load, and a partner carrier runs the linehaul. GST/HST handles this with the interlining rule: within one continuous freight movement, only the invoicing carrier, the one who bills the shipper, charges tax, and every carrier-to-carrier charge underneath is zero-rated. So the linehaul partner's invoice to you should arrive with no tax on it, and when the roles reverse and you run origin or destination service for a van line, your invoice to the van line is zero-rated too. The paper matters: the file has to show who billed the shipper, or a routine HST desk review turns into a rate argument. Your input tax credits on fuel, repairs and packing stock are unaffected either way.
The assessment when day-rate crews were never on payroll
Our moving company accounting page covers why day-rate movers on your trucks and your schedule are employees; this page covers the bill when the CRA decides that after the fact. A payroll examination that reclassifies crews assesses the employer for both shares of CPP and EI, the amounts never withheld plus the employer portions, with penalties and interest on top, and unfiled T4s carry their own penalties per slip. WSIB reads the same facts the same way and adds retroactive premiums. Recovering the employee share from workers who scattered two summers ago is theoretical. Running crews through payroll costs a fraction of one assessment, which is why we treat classification as a filing matter, not a philosophy.
Damage settlements and insurance money on the T2
Paying for a cracked armoire is a deductible cost of moving furniture, but the timing is strict. A settlement is deductible once the claim is actually resolved and owed; a reserve for claims you merely expect is a contingent amount the Income Tax Act refuses. Insurance proceeds that reimburse a settlement come back into income, so what the return really absorbs is your deductible and anything the insurer declined. Because the claim log lives in the books, the deduction on the T2 ties to named jobs and dates, which is exactly what a reviewer asks for.
The corporate calendar, filed around the season
Most of our moving clients file as CCPCs taxed at roughly 12.2% combined in Ontario on the first $500,000 of active profit, with the T2 due six months after year-end and the balance, for most small CCPCs, at three. We generally keep movers on quarterly HST periods: collections triple in summer, and a remittance that follows the peak quarter closely beats one spring surprise. Owner personal returns are prepared alongside the corporate file so salary, dividends and slips tell one story across the household. That is our Corporate Tax Filing engagement, and when a letter does arrive, an HST desk review asking for the linehaul invoices or a payroll query about summer hires, CRA Audit & Review Support answers it from the working papers we filed from, which is why most letters end at the first reply.
Source: CRA — GST/HST place of supply.
