Sales tax in New Brunswick

New Brunswick charges a single harmonized rate, which simplifies the counter considerably: one line of tax, one number on the receipt. The revenue still divides between two governments, and certain categories carry their own treatment.

For a business selling only locally this is close to the simplest arrangement outside Alberta.

Shipping out of province brings the full destination rules into play, including provinces that run a separate provincial tax with different bases and resale exemptions. A single harmonized home rate is no protection against that complexity.

The engine applies destination treatment per line, so the same invoice can carry mixed treatments correctly.

Tax is decided per line, not per invoice. Each line's treatment comes from the product's tax category and the place of supply, so a GST-only item and a GST-plus-provincial item sit on the same sale without anyone thinking about it. Combined rates split into their federal and provincial halves in the ledger — one payable account per tax actually levied — which is what lets a return be filed from the books rather than rebuilt in a spreadsheet.

The Tax report then reads that same ledger for any period: taxable sales by rate with the base for each, zero-rated sales counted rather than dropped, credit notes netted, and a self-check against the sales ledger that says so out loud when the two disagree. Input tax credits accrue from purchase documents as they are entered.