Published 14 Aug 2026
PST Is Coming to Your Home Phone, Basic Cable and Clothing Repairs on October 1
B.C. confirmed a second wave of PST changes for October 1, 2026 - this one lands on ordinary household bills, not professional invoices.
Most coverage of B.C.'s Budget 2026 sales tax changes has focused on professional services. But updates published in July 2026 confirm a second, quieter change that hits regular household bills. Effective October 1, 2026, several everyday items lose their PST exemption.
What becomes taxable
Residential landline phone service - no longer exempt from PST.
Basic cable TV service - also loses its exemption.
Toll-free telephone services - now taxable.
Services to clothing and footwear - alterations, tailoring and shoe repair, except services to protective clothing or footwear.
Clothing patterns, yarn, natural fibres, synthetic thread and fabric commonly used to make or repair clothing.
Dry-cleaning, wet-cleaning and laundry services remain exempt, even when bundled with a taxable related service. The province has also published transitional rules for billing periods that straddle October 1, so a phone or cable bill covering late September into October will be split rather than taxed in full.
Why this matters for your budget
Individually these are small amounts. At 7 per cent PST, a $45 landline plan adds roughly $3.15 a month and a $30 basic cable package adds about $2.10. The point is that they are recurring, indexed to your bill rather than to inflation, and they arrive at the same time as the professional services expansion. A household paying for a landline, basic cable and occasional tailoring could reasonably see $60 to $90 more per year, before any provider price increases.
There is also a quieter effect worth naming: the sewing and clothing-repair exemption existed partly to make mending cheaper than replacing. Taxing patterns, fabric and alteration services narrows that gap slightly for households that repair rather than buy new.
Three things to do before October
Pull your last telecom bill and check whether you are still paying for a landline or basic cable you rarely use. This is a natural moment to cut or renegotiate.
If you have a large alteration or reupholstery job planned, ask whether completing it before October 1 changes the tax treatment.
Nudge your communications and clothing expense lines up slightly from Q4 2026 onward so your projection reflects the new baseline.
In AffordaFlow, this is a small-but-permanent change to recurring expenses. Adjusting the affected categories now - rather than discovering the drift months later - keeps your cash-flow projection honest, and lets you see whether trimming an unused service more than offsets the new tax.
Source: Updates to sales taxes - Province of British Columbia (July 13, 2026 entry).