What your accountant should hand over when you leave

Start an accounting handover by agreeing which month the outgoing provider will finish. Distinguish the last period it has posted from the last period it has reconciled and reviewed. The incoming team needs to know whether it is receiving approved balances or a working ledger with unresolved items.

Put the cutover date in writing and identify who handles transactions received afterward. Without that boundary, both providers may post the same payroll journal or each may assume the other will reconcile the final bank statement.

Ask for the general ledger, trial balance, chart of accounts, customer and vendor balances, fixed asset and loan schedules, and relevant supporting documents. Include reconciliation reports and the details behind prepaid expenses, customer deposits, taxes payable, and other material balance sheet accounts.

A PDF report is useful for reference but may not contain the transaction detail needed for the next close. Request standard exports where the software supports them and confirm whether attachments are included. The IRS recordkeeping guidance is a reason to retain evidence of transactions, not a guarantee that every proprietary provider workpaper must be released; contractual and professional rules may differ.

Obtain the outstanding-question log and a list of recurring entries. For each unresolved amount, ask for the age, last action, current treatment, and person holding the missing information. A new accountant should not have to ask the founder again why a particular deposit was held in suspense.

Include tax adjustments and any differences between the accounting records and filed returns. Where the outgoing provider applied a significant policy, such as revenue timing or inventory costing, request the documented rationale and the schedules used to maintain it.

Confirm that a company-controlled administrator can access the ledger, billing subscription, bank connections, and document store before removing the outgoing team. Invite the incoming provider through named accounts with the permissions its work requires. Avoid forwarding passwords or recovery codes as a shortcut.

After the recipient confirms access and receipt of the records, remove obsolete users and review connected applications. Do not interrupt a live filing or payment process without agreeing who is taking it over. Access removal and operational continuity need to be planned together.

Have the incoming accountant reproduce one closing bank balance and one non-cash schedule from the handover files. Check that the opening trial balance matches the last approved report and that the exported detail explains its totals.

Record missing files and inaccessible attachments before the outgoing provider's support window ends. Close the handover only when the recipient has confirmed the materials are usable, or when both sides have documented the remaining limitations and who will resolve them.