Charity Governance

From a legal perspective (i.e. keeping your non-profit corporate status), the main obligations and expenses are as follows:

• Incorporation fee $155 provincially and $200 federally (in addition to any legal fees)
• Creating bylaws (if you hire a charity law firm - or if you do it yourself, using an online bylaws builder, such as the federal bylaws template or provincial there is no cost)
• Holding annual meetings and passing necessary resolutions such as electing a Board, receiving financial statements, and appointing or waiving the appointment of an auditor (no hard costs necessarily)
• Annual filings and filing notices of change whenever you change your address or directors ($0 provincially $12 federally for annual filing online and additional costs if you use a third party provider of have someone else prepare them)
• Keep adequate financial and corporate records (cost of bookkeeper or accountant and/or accounting software, B.I.G. Charity Law Group can also help in setting up and keeping corporate records, let me know if this is something of interest to you)
• Getting financial review required by the statute (can range from $2,500-$5,000 for a review engagement to $7,000-20,000 for an audit. It can really range)
  
• Depending on your size, whether you hire employees, etc. tax filings (the cost of a tax preparer)
  

You should expect to operate your not-for-profit like a business with associated startup and organizational costs. There may be other obligations and costs associated with your actual operations but the above are the bare minimum for corporate status.

‍

By Benjamin Miller, Esq.

‍