thread Re: Can you Square for coffee shop in Ontario? in Hardware Setup & Troubleshooting

Can you Square for coffee shop in Ontario?

Ontario — Sun, 21 Sep 2025 12:55:13 GMT

We are looking at a POS for a small coffee shop café that will comply with Ontario Tax laws. Has anyone been able to successfully use Shopify in Ontario for a similar business? Ontario tax laws are quite complicated for food/beverage sales: over $4 is 13% tax, under $4 is 0%, 5% or 13% depending on the item BUT if items are sold with a "qualifier" (specific items) the entire sale is 5%.

We need a POS that applies these rules automatically and does the calculation for us. Thanks!

Re: Can you Square for coffee shop in Ontario?

lenjobakes — Mon, 07 Feb 2022 14:53:56 GMT

Hey @Ontario!

I run a coffee shop/bakery in Ontario. Reading the tax laws to get set up was 😖

You can set up as many tax rules as you want with Square (i.e. no tax, 5%, or 13%), but the "standard tax" is static - if you add 6 of the same product it will not automatically remove the tax.

I have multi-packs set up which have no tax applied, and I've trained my staff to remove the tax manually if there is something we don't have set-up for a multi-pack (i.e. squares because rarely do people purchase 6 squares at a time).

I also take solace in the fact that the CRA tax act reads as such:

How to claim the rebate

Recipients of qualifying prepared food and beverages sold in Ontario receive their rebate by:

being paid or credited the rebate amount by the registrant supplier (e.g., a retailer) at the point of sale; or
filing a rebate claim with the CRA.

So...I mean, the rebate can either be credited by us OR the consumer can file a rebate claim.

We either charge 13% tax or no tax. The government isn't paying me to be a tax collector or to study their (frankly) wild tax rules and ensure they are enforced with 100% accuracy. I give the benefit to my customers and I carry on running my business.

I hope this helps! And I hope you're not a CRA agent in disguise, but if you are - my answer is the same. 😋

Tag me when you reply so I can see it! (Type @ and spell my name).

Re: Can you Square for coffee shop in Ontario?

Ontario — Mon, 07 Feb 2022 15:41:19 GMT

Thanks so much for the reply @lenjobakes!

To get around it we are doing similar to what you do, except we display our prices with the taxes included. Once quarterly I then need to export a Square report to excel and calculate what we actually need to remit to the CRA. It's a LOT of work and concentration (approximately 4 hours each time) but generally decreases what we remit to CRA by $2000/quarter so worth it for us. We also got a ruling from the CRA to confirm what we are doing is "above-board"; that being said, I'm really hoping we can find a different POS system that works with these tricky Ontario tax laws. It's tough for small businesses! If I hear anything promising I will let you know! Happy baking!

Re: Can you Square for coffee shop in Ontario?

lenjobakes — Mon, 07 Feb 2022 15:57:02 GMT

Oh my goodness, @Ontario! That is a lot of extra work!!!

I've just come to terms with the fact that the tax collected is not my money, so I have no issue passing it on. We actually put it in a savings account to gain interest until it needs to be remitted.

Would love to hear if there is a system that understands our province's taxes! Let me know if you have any other questions and I'll do my best to help 🙂