Record a sales tax payment or refund

When you pay sales tax in QuickBooks, you are recording the payment against a specific sales tax period; you are not actually transferring money to the CRA.

To record a payment or refund:

  1. In the navigation bar, click Sales Tax.
  2. Click View history.
  3. Determine which tax filing you need to pay.
  4. Click Record in the Payments column of the associated line.
  5. Select Payment or Refund and enter the appropriate information.

You can also record instalment or partial payments this way.

QuickBooks will show you how much you owe and allow you to view your sales tax payment history. For payments, you must also make a payment directly to the CRA.

Record a payment against an upcoming filing period

There are two ways to record a sales tax payment that will be applied as an instalment payment towards an upcoming filing period. From the Sales Tax page:

Correct a payment

If you accidentally use one of these options to record a payment against an upcoming filing period when you meant to record it against an existing filing, the amount will display on your next filing instead.

To correct this inaccurate filing:

  1. Try to delete the payment (it must be done before the next filing).
  2. If it cannot be deleted, create an adjustment on the next filing.

    3. Once the adjustment is complete, you will have a sales tax adjustment in both the bank account and in the Sales Tax Payable account.

  3. Record the payment correctly on the initial filing, following the steps outlined above in To record a payment or refund.
  4. File your sales tax for the next period. This will balance out all accounts.

See also

Adjust your sales tax liability

What happens after you enter a sales tax adjustment?