I am just taking on my first client who is moving away from their current bookkeeper who I know uses Sage 50.
As I also use Sage I am going to ask the current bookkeeper to provider a back -up disc up to the end of the month when they finish together with itemised printouts for all balances as per the Trial balance at that time and itemised printouts for balances on individual debtors and creditors accounts ( requested these just in case there is a problem loading back up disc as I do not know what version of Sage the current bookkeeper has - think it might be quite old). I am also going to ask for files containing sales invoices, purchase invoices,VAT records, PAYE & CIS records and bank & c/c statements.
Is there anything else I should be asking for at this stage?
Sounds pretty comprehensive. Quick brainstorm, having just completed all Sage 50 Accounts Workbooks, though not used in real world yet...
- ask for confirmation that final checks on data and COA are all clean - reasons for any balances on suspense - get all historic data backups if previous-bookkeeper kept them (back 6 years) - when was last aged debtors run and acted on (unless someone else does credit control) - been any hiccups in the VAT reporting, all up to date, submitted and archived - is the bank reconciliation(s) up to date and all in order and archived - are there Product records to maintain and all the niceties around POP and SOP (would bookkeeper be involved in this? probably not I suppose) - any unfinished updates, eg to discount structures or pricing you should know about (probably not) - are you going to have to use Foreign Trader? (probably not) - record data in CSV format to load in via Excel if data won't restore through normal channels for some reason (maybe going too far).
