Callander Accounting & Consultancy

Meet Kim McVeety and the Team Behind Callander Accounting & Consultancy

When you call Callander Accounting & Consultancy, you are calling Kim McVeety's firm. Kim is an accountant who has worked in public practice, in industry, and at the front of a college classroom, and she runs her own practice for one reason: she loves watching small businesses grow. "There's a sense of pride in being a small part of that," she says. "It's a lot more rewarding than just working for one company and dealing with one company's interests."

Kim is from Oxford County in southwestern Ontario. After college she spent eight years at a public accounting firm, where she fell for income tax. She also taught at Fanshawe College in London before she went out on her own for good.

An Award Winning Accounting Team in Callander

There are five on the team, all women, which Kim says was not by design. Stacy has been with her more than ten years; she started in administration and is now a fully trained bookkeeper. Cassandra came in a year ago on a one month placement from the payroll and bookkeeping program at CTS Canadian Career College, and Kim hired her. That placement earned Kim the college's Preceptor Award. Bo runs the front desk, and Jenn is an assistant and office manager. "It's a real honour to be able to employ them," Kim says. "We're moms, and we're running households and running businesses."

The community has noticed. The firm was named Platinum for accountants and accounting firms in the North Bay Community Votes for the third year running, and Platinum for bookkeeping and income tax this year. It is also one of three finalists for Small Business of the Year at the Chamber of Commerce Evening of Excellence on October 20.

Accounting in Callander Since 2009

Kim opened McVeety Accounting Services in 2009, when she was living in Restoule, and in those first years she drove to her clients, to their businesses and their homes. As the practice grew she moved it into Callander, into a tiny two room office behind the food bank, and stayed fourteen years. By the end there were three of them in that space, and Kim was clearing off her own desk every time a client came in to meet.

So when the bank in town announced it was closing, Kim says she may have been the only person in Callander who was happy about it. In 2024 the firm moved into the former RBC branch, and today you meet with Kim in a proper boardroom.

That boardroom wall holds the story of the building: five businesses over about 120 years. In 1906 it was Morrison's General Store, run by George Morrison, the first reeve of Callander. He was a bookkeeper from Oxford County. So is Kim. "It kind of all came full circle," she says.

The name changed with the move. McVeety Accounting Services became Callander Accounting & Consultancy, because Callander is home, and Kim wanted the business to be home too. Her website and social pages still carry the McVeety name, so you will find her under both.

What to Know Before Tax Season in Callander and North Bay

Kim's advice is simple: the more organized you are, the better the advice you get. Personal tax season always lands in the spring, and March and April are the firm's busiest months. A corporation is different. Its deadlines follow its own fiscal year end, so your business may not have a tax season at all in the usual sense.

What Kim sees more and more is a whole year of paperwork dropped off at once, with an expectation of overnight turnaround. "Everybody wants stuff right now," she says. "You're not going to get quality overnight." When her team is not racing a deadline, it has time to give you real advice. Her best service goes to clients who send their information monthly or quarterly, because then she can advise you while there is still time in the year to act on it. If she is catching up ten months of books in October, there is not much advice left for the last two.

The Late Filing Mistake That Costs Business Owners Money

Ask Kim for the most expensive mistake she sees and she does not hesitate: late filing. HST, payroll deductions, income tax. The penalties add up, and interest keeps running on the penalties too. Hands down, she says, it is the biggest mistake an owner can make.

Bookkeeping in Callander, Shoebox or Spreadsheet

You do not need to be organized to walk in the door. Clients bring tidy binders, shoeboxes, and garbage bags. Some clean the receipts out of their vehicle in the parking lot. One client drops off a pile of unopened brown envelopes a few times a year, because looking at them is the last thing they want to do, and that is fine too. The sorting is billed by time, and the team deals with all of it.

Kim has been a QuickBooks ProAdvisor for over twenty years. The team works in QuickBooks Desktop and Online, Sage, CaseWare, and Microsoft Office, and adapts to the smaller programs some clients already use. If you want a hand in your own books, they will steer you to cloud software you can log into yourself. If you would rather drop everything off and be done, they often keep your books on the desktop version, for its reporting. They will also teach you the software, at your place or theirs.

Why Kim Teaches You to Read Your Own Financial Statements

Kim taught income tax, and she never really stopped teaching. She still quotes a line a wise man once told her: "I teach for free. I get paid to mark."

Her reason is practical. If you only make decisions by what is in the bank account, you are guessing. Over the years you learn when your cash rises and falls, but that does not tell you how your statements will finish the year. And when you go to borrow, the bank looks at far more than the bottom line. It looks at ratios and factors inside your statements. Understand those, and you can make decisions that keep your statements strong and your borrowing power with them. That is why her year end work includes walking you through your statements, your margins, and ways to improve your bottom line.

What Clients Say About Kim and Her Team

The thing Kim most wants you to notice is the personal touch. Her team gets to know who you are, your whole business, and your next steps, rather than pushing numbers out the door. Her reviews say it in their own words: clients of twenty years, clients who had their deductions explained, and owners who say she helped their business grow.

New clients come by referral, and Kim says she has never had to go looking for one. Most are local small and growing businesses and families. The firm also works for larger clients in the Toronto area, including production and food service companies in film and entertainment. Her real love, she says, is the businesses right here.

Accounting and Tax Services for Callander and North Bay

Callander Accounting & Consultancy handles personal, business, corporate, and estate tax; bookkeeping; HST, WSIB, and payroll filings with full audit support; year end financial statements; software training; and business plans for a bank loan or a grant. The office is open 9 to 5, Monday to Friday, with some appointments outside those hours, and you can send your documents through the firm's secure online portal instead of by email.

Outside the office you will find Kim fishing on Lake Nipissing or other waters, and simply enjoying time with family. She had just come back from a fishing trip to Lake of the Woods near Kenora, with shepherd's pie and lasagna cooked ahead for the camper. On Fridays she has lunch with her staff, often from local Callander restaurants, and she will tell you how much she likes seeing local businesses support each other.

Her own line sums up the firm: "Relax, accounting really can be this easy."