T2 Filing Requirement Checker
A corporation files a T2 every year until it is formally dissolved. Three answers show whether a return is owed for this year.
Written and reviewed by Sharad Gondaliya, CPA (Ontario), CPA Ontario Membership 61040184.
Last reviewed: October 30, 2026
Answer all three questions.
Gondaliya CPA Professional Corporation is a registered EFILE electronic filer. Returns are prepared and transmitted in Canada. Credentials are never shared and never used offshore.
The Rule Has No Activity Test In It
A corporation must file a T2 within six months of its fiscal year-end, every year, until it is formally dissolved. There is no threshold in that sentence and no exemption for a quiet year.
Which is why the question people ask, whether they have to file, nearly always has the same answer. The useful question is the one underneath it: what the return says when there is nothing to report. That is what a nil return is, and it is $300.00 plus HST per tax year.
What People Think Exempts Them
Three beliefs account for most unfiled years, and none of them is right. No income, no bank account and never having started trading are all descriptions of a nil year rather than reasons there is no year.
The fourth is subtler and more costly: that a corporation nobody has touched for years has somehow lapsed. It has not. An unfiled year stays open, and the unfiled years checker lists the ones outstanding.
| What people believe | What it actually means |
|---|---|
| The corporation had no income | A description of a nil year. The return is still owed |
| It has no bank account | There is no asset test in the filing requirement |
| It never started trading | Returns are owed from incorporation, not from first sale |
| Nobody has touched it for years | Every one of those years is an unfiled year |
| It was dissolved mid-year | A final return is owed for the period up to that date |
| The year is before incorporation | Correct. There is no tax year and nothing to file |
The One Case Where Nothing Is Owed
A year before incorporation is not an unfiled year. A tax year belongs to a corporation, so where there was no corporation there is no year and nothing to file.
That sounds obvious written down and it is worth stating, because a visitor counting backwards through years of silence often counts past the incorporation date. The years to file start there, not at the point the business stopped being active.
A Dissolution Year Is Still a Year
Where a corporation is dissolved part-way through a year, the period runs to the dissolution date and a return is owed for it. That return is the final T2 and it closes the record rather than being waived because the corporation has gone.
Dissolving with years outstanding leaves those years open behind it. The final T2 return due date calculator dates that last return, and the dissolution readiness checker tests whether the corporation is ready for the step.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does a corporation with no activity have to file a T2?
Yes. A corporation must file a T2 within six months of its fiscal year-end, every year, until it is formally dissolved. Having nothing to report changes what the return says, not whether it is owed.
Does having no bank account exempt a corporation?
No. There is no activity test and no asset test in the filing requirement. A corporation with no bank account files a nil return.
What if the corporation never started trading?
It still files. A corporation that was incorporated and then left alone owes a return for every year since incorporation.
Do I owe a return for years before incorporation?
No. A tax year belongs to a corporation, so a year before the corporation existed is not an unfiled year.
Is a return owed for the year a corporation is dissolved?
Yes. The period runs to the dissolution date and the return for it is the final T2.
Nil T2 Filing, $300.00 plus HST per tax year
Type your corporation name, pick your unfiled years, pay, and sign Form T183CORP on a secure screen. Your CRA confirmation is emailed within 3 business days.
Start Nil T2 Filing NOW