Quebec QuickBooks Sales Tax Codes: GST/QST QC, GST, QST QC (Free)

QuickBooks Online gives Quebec the most symmetric code set in Canada: a combined code for the normal case, single-tax codes for the asymmetries, and the usual zeros. Behind the symmetry sits Quebec’s defining fact, that the provincial tax recovers like the federal one, which makes the coding decisions here about suppliers and documents rather than about which tax applies. This reference walks the list with the CSV attached.

Six codes, one economy

• GST/QST QC (14.975%): the default for taxable Quebec purchases and sales. Registrants recover both halves; the code’s job is keeping the components tracked for the combined Revenu Quebec return.
• GST (5%): bills from Canadian suppliers outside QST registration. Honest recording of what was actually charged, with QST self-assessment a separate, visible decision.
• QST QC (9.975%): the provincial-only code for self-assessments and corrections.
• Z (0%): zero-rated under both taxes, groceries, exports, international fares; recoveries intact.
• E: exempt under both, financial services, insurance, residential rent; no recoveries on related costs.
• Out of scope: payroll, permits, donations, transfers; outside both systems.

The recovery exceptions, doubled

Quebec’s exceptions run in stereo, cutting both taxes at once. Meals and entertainment: half the ITC and half the ITR for most businesses, so the 14.975% on a client dinner yields roughly half back in total. Club memberships: nothing back under either tax. Vehicles: capped and apportioned under both. And insurance carries no GST or QST at all but arrives with Quebec’s own premium tax at the QST-harmonized rate, a cost line that fools ledgers migrated from other provinces.

Suppliers are the real classification

Because both taxes recover, the daily question is not what kind of purchase this is but who billed it and how. Quebec vendors: 14.975%, both numbers on their invoice. Rest-of-Canada vendors without QST registration: 5%, and a once-per-vendor note about self-assessment. Foreign platforms: either properly registered (both taxes, recoverable) or on simplified regimes whose tax you cannot claim, fixed by handing over your registration numbers. A supplier map, maintained casually in the readable CSV of the matching chart, answers ninety percent of coding questions before they are asked.

Filing rhythm

One return to Revenu Quebec covers both taxes, which concentrates the reconciliation: the combined liability account ties to the filing each period, ITCs and ITRs claimed from the same document pile. The retention rules stay federal-grade, six years, and Revenu Quebec audits with the thoroughness of an administration that runs two taxes at once.

1. Enable sales tax; the Quebec codes provision natively.
2. Let the Quebec chart of accounts for QuickBooks set defaults; treat this list as the exception guide.
3. Decide Z, E, or Out of scope deliberately on every no-tax line.
4. Sweep the meals and club accounts before filing; stereo over-claims are Quebec’s signature error.
5. Review the supplier map quarterly for vendors whose registration status moved.

Month-end in a Quebec file is a three-step walk worth ritualizing. First, the liability: the combined GST/QST balance against what the period’s coded lines say was collected and recoverable. Second, the exceptions: the meals and club accounts, where recovery limits mean the claimable number is not the coded number. Third, the supplier map: any vendor whose billing pattern changed this period gets their note updated before the memory fades. Three steps, perhaps twenty minutes, and the return files itself from clean inputs instead of being assembled from archaeology.

The dual-tax document stream rewards tooling early. Dext rules the recurring suppliers. ExpenseFlow reads each bill, tells 14.975% from 5% from unclaimable, applies the stereo recovery cuts where they belong, and posts coded entries into QuickBooks feeding the single Revenu Quebec return. Hubdoc keeps the documents filed against it.

Xero’s version of the same system needs four custom rates; that story is the Quebec Xero tax rates reference.