- CRA does not require original paper documents.
- A digital receipt or scanned image generally holds up well when it meets a few practical conditions: - It’s legible.
- Once a paper receipt has been properly scanned or photographed and stored in a way that meets the conditions above, keeping the original paper is generally not required.
Paper receipts fade, get lost in a glove compartment, or simply never get requested in the first place — most vendors now issue a digital receipt by default. That leaves a lot of Ontario business owners wondering whether they actually need to hold onto paper at all, or whether a photo, a PDF, or an accounting-app scan is genuinely good enough if CRA ever asks. The short answer is yes, with conditions — and the conditions are where people run into trouble.
Does CRA Accept Digital-Only Records?
Yes. CRA does not require original paper documents. Electronic records — including scanned images of paper receipts, PDF invoices, and records generated directly in digital form (like an emailed invoice or an app-based expense record) — are generally acceptable, provided the underlying requirements for adequate books and records are still met.
Those underlying requirements don’t change just because the record is digital: the record still needs to be accurate, complete, legible, and retrievable in a usable form for as long as it needs to be kept.
What Makes a Digital Record Acceptable
A digital receipt or scanned image generally holds up well when it meets a few practical conditions:
- It’s legible. A blurry phone photo where the amount or vendor name can’t be read defeats the purpose of keeping the record at all.
- It’s complete. The image or file captures the whole document — not a cropped version missing the date, vendor, or amount.
- It’s stored reliably. Cloud storage, a dedicated accounting platform, or a properly backed-up local drive — not a photo buried in an unsorted phone camera roll with no backup.
- It’s retrievable when needed. You (or your bookkeeper) need to actually be able to find and produce the specific record if it’s requested — a disorganized digital pile is only marginally better than no record at all.
- The original data isn’t altered. Digital records need to reflect the transaction as it actually occurred; editing amounts or details after the fact is a records-integrity problem, not a formatting convenience.
Scanning Paper Receipts: What to Do With the Originals
Once a paper receipt has been properly scanned or photographed and stored in a way that meets the conditions above, keeping the original paper is generally not required. That said, many business owners keep originals for a short transition period — a month or a filing quarter — simply as a safety net while confirming their digital backup process is reliable, before discarding paper entirely.
Common Ways Digital Recordkeeping Goes Wrong
- No consistent backup. A phone that’s lost, stolen, or replaced without a backup can wipe out months of receipt photos in an instant.
- Receipts scattered across multiple apps or accounts with no single system tying them to the transactions they support.
- Faded thermal-paper receipts scanned too late. Many retail receipts fade within weeks; if you’re going to scan instead of keeping paper, do it promptly, before the image itself becomes illegible.
- Treating a bank or credit card statement as a substitute for a receipt. A statement shows that money moved and roughly when — it usually doesn’t show what was purchased or why it was a business expense, which is what a proper receipt or invoice establishes.
- No file naming or organization system, which technically preserves the record but makes it practically impossible to produce quickly if requested.
A Simple Digital Recordkeeping Workflow
- Capture the receipt immediately — photograph or scan it at the time of purchase, before paper fades or gets lost.
- File it against the transaction, whether through accounting software, a labelled folder structure, or a receipt-management app.
- Back it up in at least one place beyond the original device — cloud storage or a synced accounting platform, not just a phone’s local storage.
- Reconcile monthly so gaps are caught while the transaction is still fresh in memory, not at year-end when details are harder to reconstruct.
- Retain records for as long as your obligations require, keeping in mind that some records need to survive well beyond a single filing year — for example, if they relate to an asset you still own or a year that remains open to reassessment.
Frequently asked questions
Can I just rely on my bank and credit card statements instead of keeping receipts?
Generally, no — a statement shows that a payment was made but usually doesn’t show what was purchased or establish the business purpose, which is what CRA looks for when verifying a deduction. Receipts and statements serve different, complementary purposes.
Is a photo taken on my phone good enough, or do I need a proper scanner?
A phone photo is acceptable as long as it’s clear, complete, and properly backed up and organized — the format matters less than whether the resulting image reliably preserves and lets you retrieve the information.
What if my accounting software automatically imports receipts from my email — is that enough on its own?
Automated imports can be a strong part of a system, but you’re still responsible for making sure the records captured are accurate, complete, and retrievable, and for keeping backups outside a single app in case access to that platform is ever lost.
Do digital records need to be kept in a specific file format?
There’s no single mandated file format — the focus is on whether the record is legible, complete, and can be produced when needed, not on whether it’s a PDF, JPEG, or another common format.
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