How do I get paid on this job?
Your deposit, your draws, the provincial holdback, and the deepest you go out of pocket. Free, no sign-up, nothing leaves this browser.
Your payment schedule
DEEPEST CASH GAP
$9,700.00
at the supplier payment before draw 1
Money in against your supplier bill. Labour and overhead are not counted.
This calculation assumes each scheduled gross amount represents the statutory price or value of services and materials actually supplied for that draw; verify the supplied value if it differs.
The scheduleType a percentage or a dollar amount. Edit a row and the others hold still, so the total can go off; we'll tell you by how much.
All amounts exclude GST/HST.
Wording for your quote
This schedule is a planning tool, not legal or tax advice. Holdback rules, deposit limits and cancellation rights differ by province and they change. Check yours with a lawyer or your provincial ministry before you sign.
https://industryoversight.ca/tools/payment-schedule-builder/
The schedule on this page is built in your browser, so with scripting off the numbers stop moving. The default job is still worked out in full below: a $48,000.00 Ontario kitchen, a 10.0% deposit, four draws, and $14,500.00 owed to the supplier at order. On that schedule the deepest cash gap is $9,700.00, at the supplier payment before draw 1, and $12,960.00 is still unpaid on the last day of work.
This calculation assumes each scheduled gross amount represents the statutory price or value of services and materials actually supplied for that draw; verify the supplied value if it differs.
Holdback by province, dataset v1.1Ontario, British Columbia and Alberta are sourced to the statute. For ordinary private residential work, the cited Quebec Civil Code provisions set no fixed statutory holdback percentage. The other six provinces are manual entry: we do not assert a percentage for them.
How this schedule is worked out
Your contract value splits into a deposit and a set of draws. Each draw is a percentage or a dollar amount, and the arithmetic runs in whole cents, so the rows you see are the rows that get added up. The last draw carries any odd cent left over. That's why the schedule lands on your contract value exactly instead of a dollar under it.
The holdback is not a percentage in a footnote. It's a line. In Ontario, British Columbia and Alberta the rate, the base it is figured on and the release trigger all come out of the statutes themselves. The section number sits beside the figure so you can go and read it. The dataset version prints under that line too.
Quebec is not Ontario with a different number. For an ordinary private residential job, the cited Quebec Civil Code provisions set no fixed statutory holdback percentage, and the security for the people who worked on the job includes a legal hypothec under the Civil Code. Pick Quebec and the holdback line disappears rather than quietly filling in someone else's rule. Six provinces are manual entry: you put in the percentage, we do the arithmetic, and we don't pretend to know what your statute says. Yukon, the Northwest Territories and Nunavut are not in the list at all, so this schedule has nothing to tell you about them.
The cash gap is the one number a template can't give you. It counts the money landing in your account against the bill your supplier sends, event by event, and reports the deepest point. Labour and overhead aren't in it. Neither is tax. If the curve dips hard before the first draw, that's a real hole, and you're financing it.
Questions contractors ask about holdback and deposits
When is the holdback released in Ontario?
It depends on the branch. Holdback not already paid or payable under the annual-release rules generally follows the applicable 60-day lien-expiry period, after which section 26 (8) allows no more than 14 days for payment. After each contract anniversary, sections 26 (2)-(7) instead require notice within 14 days and, absent a preserved or perfected lien, payment at least 60 and no later than 74 days after publication. The tool asks whether an anniversary may occur and will not silently force the ordinary branch.
Is the holdback 10% everywhere in Canada?
No. Ontario, British Columbia and Alberta use 10%, but they measure it against different things and release it on different branches. British Columbia's holdback period is 55 days; Alberta is ordinarily 60 days but uses 90 days for the statutory concrete-work branch; Ontario also has mandatory annual release. For an ordinary private residential job, the cited Quebec Civil Code provisions set no fixed percentage. For the other six provinces we ask you for the figure rather than guessing it.
How much deposit should a contractor ask for?
Ask for what you actually have to spend before you start, and be able to name it. Ontario's own consumer page tells homeowners to keep down payments near 10%, so anything above that is a conversation you'll have to win. Sizing the deposit against a cabinet order you pay for on the day it's placed wins it. Sizing it against habit doesn't.
Does the holdback come off before or after GST/HST?
CRA recognizes both presentations represented here: tax may be included in the retained amount, or the holdback may be deducted from pre-tax consideration and tax charged on the non-held amount. Enter the amounts consistently. GST/HST on a statutory or written construction holdback generally becomes payable on the earlier of payout and expiry of the holdback period.
Who holds the holdback on a home renovation?
In Ontario, British Columbia and Alberta, your customer generally does. On an ordinary contractor-to-homeowner job there, the homeowner is the owner under the statute, and the statute puts the holdback on them. A homeowner may be unfamiliar with the term. Put it in the schedule on day one and it reads as professional practice. Spring it at the end and it reads as a demand.
What about Quebec?
For an ordinary private residential job, Quebec runs a different system. Security for people who worked on the job includes a legal hypothec of construction under the Civil Code, articles 2726 and 2727: it exists without being registered, it lasts 30 days after the work is finished, and it dies six months after unless it's preserved. Articles 2111-2112 and 2123 also allow case-specific withholding for apparent defects and certain notified claims. Those cited provisions set no fixed percentage to plug into this schedule, so we don't render one. Public-construction and consumer itinerant-merchant rules can differ.
Can't I just use a template I found online?
You can, but a generic template may omit province-specific rules and supplier timing. This calculator combines those inputs and calculates how much of this particular job is unpaid on its last day.
A contractor payment schedule that knows about holdback
A payment schedule is two decisions wearing one name. The first is how the money splits: a deposit, then draws tied to events a customer can watch happening. The second is what the law does to that split, and in Canada the law does quite a lot. The sourced Ontario, British Columbia and Alberta rows use statutory holdback rules, the six manual provinces require a user-entered percentage, and the cited Quebec private-residential provisions use a different regime. The base and trigger differ: British Columbia can include a deposit paid on account, Ontario has an annual-release branch, and Alberta has a 90-day concrete-work branch.
A generic American template may capture the milestone split while omitting the Canadian province's release rule, calculation base and vocabulary. That mismatch can remain invisible until the last day, when the schedule still shows money unpaid and the contractor needs to explain why.
We split the contract, apply the province's own rule with the section number attached, draw the cash curve against what you owe your supplier, and hand you the wording. All of it runs in your browser. You don't need an account, and there's no file to download.
Put the schedule beside your listing
The schedule you just built is a document you're about to hand a homeowner, and it answers a question they were going to ask anyway. So does a listing. We run Industry Oversight, our Canada-wide directory for homeowners looking for contractors, and a listing is free. Not free-for-now. Free.
Put your trade, your province and your finished work in front of the people already searching for it. If somebody else has been listed under your business name, take it back.
Or look at who the homeowners are seeing:
- General Contractors
- Kitchen Remodelers
- Bathroom Remodeling Contractors
- Custom Home Builders
- Deck Builders
- Roofing Contractors
Quoting outside your usual patch this season? Start with Ontario contractors by city.
More tools from us:
What should I actually charge per hour?
Scheduling the money only helps if the rate underneath it covers your year. This one works that out from your own days and costs.
They haven't answered my quote. What do I send?
For the quote that went out on Tuesday and never came back.
Copy the link before you close the tab and your numbers ride along in it. When the customer comes back wanting one more thing, you reopen the schedule instead of building it twice.