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Perfect Pour = Unreported Sales (and Taxes)?

Huh?  Do you mean that if I never over-pour drinks, my establishment can still be accused of under-reporting my sales (and taxes) during an audit?  That can’t be right!  Can it?  Unfortunately, it IS true for almost every restaurant and bar in Canada!  Today’s post explains how this happens and what you can do about it.

Most restaurants and bars use shot glasses or portion control pourers to accurately measure the amount of liquor that goes into cocktails, mixed drinks and shots.  Meticulously training bartenders and monitoring pouring, you’re fairly confident that your pouring is fairly accurate, if not “perfect”.  Even if it is, your establishment will be over-pouring all of your liquor drinks by at least 4%!

Why?

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Theft = More Taxes

Most restaurateurs know they lose the cost of the pilfered product, but few understand that they may be responsible for the sales and income taxes (plus penalties and interest) that would have been incurred had the stolen product been sold.  Significant tax liabilities often arise from sales (and income) tax audits of restaurants and bars.  This can occur anytime purchased wine, beer and liquor is not sold, and one of the most common (and largest) causes of these items not being sold is theft and fraud.

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The Real Threat

Despite what has been published in the press and disclosed by the CRA and the Ministry of Revenue Quebec (MRQ), the use of zappers has not reached epidemic proportions in the restaurant industry.  Zappers have been around since the mid-1990s, though most of the usage seems to have been confined to Quebec.  In fact, the vast majority of the convictions for sales tax evasion have occurred in Quebec.  For background on the use and abuse of zappers, please read this, this, and this.  The unfortunate thing about all of this attention is that it may draw our attention away from a far larger threat to our operations.  The indirect audit approach.

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Restaurant Tax Fraud – Then and Now

Recently, we’ve begun to hear a lot more about tax evasion in the restaurant industry.  More specifically, we’re talking about technologically-assisted tax fraud, using zappers or phantom-ware.  It made the news, again this past week, when it was disclosed that the Canada Revenue Agency had found more than $40M of unreported tax in the restaurant industry attributed to the use of zappers.  Today’s post looks at the issue of tax fraud in the restaurant industry and tries to determine how “rampant” it might be.

While tax fraud can occur in many different ways, when we talk about the restaurant industry, it usually takes the form of cash sales “skimmed” off and not reported for tax purposes.

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It’s Going to get a Whole Lot Worse!

I don’t want to scare you, but I feel it is my duty as a fellow restaurateur and as an accountant.  After reading this headline, many of you will think this blog entry is going to be about the economy and how it will affect your restaurant business.  As for the economy, I think the worst is behind us, but there is another threat to your business that is going to be a lot worse in the next few years.  Let me explain…

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Zapper Update

Today’s Toronto Star ran an article about restaurants hiding cash income.  You can find it here:  Restaurant probe finds $40M in ‘phantom’ sales.

Until recently, most detective work surrounding the use of zappers had been focused in Quebec.  Now, we find out that the CRA has been involved in a two year, national probe of the restaurant industry.  So far, they’ve found about $40 million of unreported income, though they expect to find much more by next March when the study is completed.

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Auditproofing – Average Costs

So far, I’ve discussed the POS system and how to maintain it for accurate reporting, how to document your sales mix for all audit periods, and the importance of maintaining an accurate history of your menu prices.  Taken together, these bookkeeping tasks are crucial in helping the restaurateur determine, and properly support, accurate weighted average prices.  This is a crucial component of the mark-up calculation performed during a typical audit.

Now we’ll take a look at the actual cost of the alcoholic beverages purchased for sale.

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Auditproofing – Tracking Menu Changes

As a restaurateur, you probably have a general idea how your menus and prices have changed over the last few years.  Unfortunately, only having a “general idea” can land you in a big pot of trouble when your restaurant is audited.  This post reviews a few of the methods of documenting key changes to your menu and prices.  When the time comes, you will have accurate, credible information to support your actual margins and document the reasons for variances from the expected margins.

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Auditproofing – Know Your Mix

This is the second post in the series on auditproofing your restaurant from an unfair audit.  Most restaurants and bars with weak internal controls (almost all independent establishments), will be audited by the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) or a provincial tax authority using an indirect audit approach.  In most cases, this approach will be the mark-up method, which seeks to project the sales level that was likely to have been generated based on the amount of alcoholic beverages purchased by the establishment.  As we have seen in other posts, this audit method involves making a number of assumptions about the operation.  Determining what these assumptions should be, can be quite complicated.

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