Medical, dental and incorporated professionals
Accounting for incorporated medical and dental professionals.
For BC physicians, dentists, optometrists, veterinarians and lawyers: professional corporations set up and maintained properly, tax deferral, and income splitting where the rules allow, all within your regulatory college's requirements.
Sound familiar?
What we hear from incorporated professionals.
High income, a regulated profession, and not enough time to think about the tax side. We do that part.
- You are considering a professional corporation but are not sure it is worth the setup and upkeep
- You have a corp but you are leaving money in it without a plan for using it efficiently
- You have heard income splitting changed and are not sure what still applies to you
- You want to defer tax on income you do not need to draw personally this year
- Your incorporation needs to satisfy your college's rules and you want it done right
- You are planning for an associate buy-in, a practice purchase, or eventual sale
- You would like one accountant who understands both your practice income and your personal tax
How we help
Accounting for professional corporations.
The structuring and planning that matters most when you earn through a regulated practice.
INC
Incorporation and setup
Establishing your professional corporation in line with your college's requirements, and maintaining it properly year over year.
DEF
Tax deferral planning
Where you do not need all your income personally, we plan how to retain and invest within the corporation to defer personal tax.
SPL
Income splitting where permitted
We work within the tax on split income rules to identify legitimate splitting opportunities with family where they genuinely apply.
REM
Remuneration strategy
The right balance of salary and dividends for your situation, coordinated with RRSP room and personal goals.
TAX
Corporate and personal tax
T2 and T1 prepared together, plus financial statements your bank or college may require.
TRN
Practice transitions
Support around associate buy-ins, practice purchases and succession, structured with tax in mind.
Worth knowing
Planning within the rules, including your college's.
Professional corporations sit at the intersection of tax law and your regulatory body's requirements, including share-ownership restrictions that affect who can be a shareholder. Income splitting is separately limited by the tax on split income rules.
We plan only what the rules allow and we explain the reasoning in plain language. Everything here is general information, not advice for your specific facts.
Common questions
Questions we get.
Is a professional corporation worth it for me?
It depends on how much of your income you actually need personally. The main benefit is deferral: income left in the corporation is taxed at corporate rates rather than your personal rate, and the difference compounds. If you draw everything out to live on, the benefit is much smaller and the annual cost of maintaining the corporation may not be worth it. We would run the numbers on your situation before recommending it.
Can I still split income with my spouse?
Sometimes, but the tax on split income rules introduced in 2018 removed most of the easy answers. There are exclusions, including for a spouse where the business owner is over 65, and for family members meaningfully engaged in the business. Whether any of them apply to you is a facts question, and your college's share-ownership restrictions may limit who can hold shares in the first place.
What happens to the corporation if I sell or wind down the practice?
That is worth planning for well before it happens. A professional corporation holding retained earnings and investments needs a strategy for getting that money out efficiently, and the structure that suits an associate buy-in is not always the one that suits a wind-down.
Next step
Book a call.
Fifteen or twenty minutes, no charge. You describe the situation, David tells you whether he can help and what it would cost.
(778) 980-7276
info@dsjmaccounting.com