Dental Professional Corporation for Dentists

Contact Neufeld Legal PC for your incorporation legal work at 403-400-4092 / 905-616-8864 or Chris@NeufeldLegal.com

As a dentist, structuring your dental operations to derive legal benefits and optimize profitability, should be a priority in your professional career, whether this entails the incorporation of a dentist’s professional corporation or further incorporations associated with the acquisition of dental equipment and/or real estate tied to one’s ever-growing dental practice, and demands appropriate legal structuring to integrate all these business components for optimal results.

At the outset, dentists will look to incorporate their dental practice as a professional corporation which enables them to draw upon certain business and tax advantages that are available when operating one’s professional practice through a professional corporation.

A professional corporation enables a dentist to realize certain tax advantages attainable by traditional corporations, including:

• the small business deduction, with its preferential corporate tax rates and ability to defer taxes,

• remuneration flexibility, allowing for a sufficient salary and appropriate tax planning / RRSP contributions,

• the availability of the lifetime capital gains exemption for the owner of a qualifying corporation,

• the potential for absolute tax savings from structuring the corporate payment of non-deductible or partly deductible expenses, and

• potential income splitting, although this is subject to increasingly stringent tax rules, together with restrictions on permissible shareholders.

There is also the strategic availability of using a non-calendar year-end, as well as various advanced tax planning opportunities, such as individual pension plans, retirement compensation arrangements and corporate-owned life insurance solutions.

To realize these corporate tax advantages, the provincial legislatures and the dentists’ regulatory bodies (i.e., Royal College of Dental Surgeons of Ontario, College of Dental Surgeons of Alberta) agreed not to shield the dentists from liability arising from their professional malpractice and negligence, although dentists might have a degree of personal liability protection as to corporate business debts, payables and other financial obligations, although most significant debts and payment obligations contractually demand personal obligations from the dentists.

The professional corporation thus provides important corporate and tax benefits to most dentists as it relates to the management of their dental practice, such that most dentists need to consider the value of incorporating a professional corporation.

As one’s dental career develops and becomes about more than themselves, whether that means partnering with other dentists, hiring employees, acquiring dental equipment and real estate associated with the dental practice, there are other legal demands and opportunities, which can include additional legal and corporate structuring, from legal arrangements to additional incorporations, which enables the business to exceed the limitations of the professional corporation and optimize the legal options that are available.

Throughout this process, the importance of legal planning and experience cannot be understated, such that tackling the legal aspects of your dental business can greatly benefit from the involvement of knowledgeable legal counsel, which we have providing to dentists for over two decades.

When you incorporate your dental practice as a professional corporation with our law firm, you will benefit from the professional services of an experienced corporate lawyer who understands the importance of devising the appropriate corporate structure for your business operations, meeting the requirements of your profession's regulatory body, on a cost-effective basis - with flat rates* for the professional corporation (Alberta and Ontario). So if you are looking to incorporate your dental practice as a professional corporation or deal with the corporate legalities impacting your dental professional corporation, contact our law firm at 403-400-4092 [Alberta], 905-616-8864 [Ontario] or via email at Chris@NeufeldLegal.com.

* Please contact our law firm for our current flat rates associated with undertaking the incorporation of a dental professional corporation in Ontario and Alberta. It should be noted that this flat rate incorporation of a dental professional corporation does not involve other matters that might be corrollary to the incorporation process or might be atypical for a standard incorporation, including but not limited to related legal or tax advice, engagement with other governmental bodies or professional bodies, licensing, drafting of pertinent business contracts (i.e., shareholders' agreements), negotiations, disputes, financing, coordination with other companies or other legal structuring.