A warm referral, a routine-looking business, a partner too busy to run the usual checks. Three months later the firm has inherited two years of unreconciled accounts, a second entity nobody mentioned, and forty hours it will never bill.
Every one of those problems sat in plain view before the engagement started. What was missing was a step that forced someone to look. This guide is that step.
What’s Inside?
- A client acceptance screen that tells you whether to say yes, before you commit your name, your liability, and your team’s time
- Where AML and client due diligence obligations now sit across the US, UK, Canada, and Australia, including the AUSTRAC changes arriving in 2026
- How to write an engagement letter that stops scope creep and protects you in a dispute
- A records and access handover checklist, so you don’t discover a mess the night before a filing deadline
- A first-90-days plan that sets client expectations you can actually keep
- How to turn the whole process into a repeatable system your team runs the same way every time
Who is it for?
- Accounting and tax firm owners
- Partners
- Practice managers
- Any firm who takes on new clients and want fewer surprises after they say yes.
What makes it different?
Most onboarding content stops at workflow setup. This guide starts a step earlier, at the decision to accept a client, and works through the acceptance, compliance, scope, and liability questions that apply to every engagement you take on, whether that’s accounts, tax, or advisory.
If onboarding keeps costing you write-offs and compliance headaches, this is the checklist that moves the risk to the front, where it’s cheap to handle.
Download the guide and get the full checklist today!
