About Canopy
Canopy is building a smarter way for innovation-heavy companies to prepare, organise and support their R&D Tax Incentive claims.
The R&D Tax Incentive process is often painful, expensive and too retrospective. Companies do genuine technical work throughout the year, but when claim time arrives, the evidence is often scattered across documents, people’s memory, finance records and project tools. Canopy helps bring that evidence together earlier, so R&D claims can be prepared in a cleaner, faster and more defensible way.
Canopy helps companies capture and organise their R&D evidence, connect technical activity to expenditure, identify gaps, and prepare cleaner claim-ready documentation. Our goal is to make the R&D claim process faster, more affordable and more defensible, while still ensuring appropriate professional review and compliance.
We are now looking for a registered tax agent with R&D Tax Incentive experience to work with us as an independent contractor.
The Role
We are looking for a Contract Registered Tax Agent - R&D Tax Incentive Review & Supervision to support Canopy’s R&D tax work, help strengthen our review process, and assist with our pathway towards operating as a compliant registered tax agent entity.
This is not an employee role. It is intended to be a flexible independent contractor engagement for someone who already operates professionally in tax, accounting, R&D tax, grants, or advisory work and wants to work with an early-stage technology company on a part-time basis.
You would work with Canopy to review R&D claim materials, provide technical tax guidance where appropriate, help design compliant review processes, and supervise relevant tax-agent-related work in line with TPB expectations.
What You Would Do
Your role may include:
- Reviewing R&D Tax Incentive claim packs prepared through Canopy’s process
- Assessing whether the documentation is clear, complete and suitable for professional review
- Reviewing R&D eligibility positions, expenditure treatment and supporting evidence
- Providing guidance on claim quality, risk areas and documentation gaps
- Helping Canopy build internal review checklists, QA processes and escalation rules
- Supporting Canopy’s pathway towards TPB registration and ongoing compliance
- Supervising relevant tax-agent-related work where required
- Advising on practical R&D tax issues across software, medtech, engineering, product development and other innovation-heavy sectors
- Helping improve Canopy’s product from a tax compliance and practitioner workflow perspective
- Working with the founding team to make the R&D claim process cleaner, faster and more scalable
What We Are Looking For
You must be:
- A currently registered tax agent in Australia
- Experienced with the R&D Tax Incentive
- Comfortable reviewing R&D eligibility, activity descriptions, supporting evidence and expenditure positions
- Familiar with TPB obligations and professional standards
- Able to exercise independent professional judgement
- Comfortable working with an early-stage startup
- Available on a flexible contractor basis
- Able to invoice for your time through an ABN or business entity
- Comfortable working remotely and asynchronously where appropriate
Ideal Experience
Strong candidates may have experience in:
- R&D tax advisory
- Tax consulting
- Accounting or business advisory
- Government grants or innovation incentives
- Reviewing R&D claims for startups, scaleups, software companies, medtech companies or engineering businesses
- Working in or around Big 4, mid-tier, boutique R&D advisory, specialist tax practices or independent consulting
You do not need to be full-time. This role is designed for someone who may already have their own practice, consulting work, accounting role or advisory business and wants to contribute to Canopy on a flexible contractor basis.
Engagement Structure
This is a contractor opportunity, not an employment position.
The successful person would:
- Work on a flexible, part-time basis
- Be paid at an contractor rate equivalent of $65–$100 per hour, depending on experience
- Invoice Canopy for agreed work performed
- Control how they provide their professional services, subject to agreed deliverables, quality standards and compliance requirements
- Continue to be responsible for their own tax, insurance, professional obligations and registrations
- Be free to continue working with other clients, subject to confidentiality and conflict requirements
For the right person, there may also be an opportunity to discuss future equity or options if the relationship becomes a long-term strategic fit.
Why Join Canopy
This is an opportunity to help shape a new model for R&D tax delivery in Australia.
You would be joining at an early stage, working closely with the founders, and helping build the compliance and review layer behind a technology-enabled R&D tax platform.
We are not looking for someone to simply “rubber stamp” claims. We are looking for someone who cares about quality, defensibility and client outcomes, and who wants to help build a better process from the ground up.
How to Apply
If you are interested, please email [email protected] with:
- A short note about your R&D tax experience
- Your TPB registration status
- Your current availability
- Your CV or LinkedIn profile
Pay: $65.00 – $100.00 per hour
Work Location: Remote
