Accounting and tax firms
Your firm's methods, with the clients left out
Checklists, close procedures and review notes. Client files and taxpayer data stay out.
Get my rangeThe value in a firm's files
Standards are published. How your reviewers think is not: the step added to a close checklist after a hard year, or the note that sent a reconciliation back.
Your checklists, templates and review steps are where that thinking is written down.
Records that tend to qualify
- Engagement checklists. The way jobs are planned and written up.
- Close procedures. The real sequence of a month or year end close.
- Review notes and sign-off. Flags from reviewers and the work that clears them.
- Internal templates and guides. How new people at the firm get trained.
First question from owners: what about client and taxpayer data?
Taxpayer data and client files are kept out. Tax return information is under strict confidentiality rules, so your practice and its counsel decide whether any tax material is in scope. We do not give legal advice or say licensing is permitted for any practice.
What matters is how your practice works. Any name that remains, whether a person, client or company, is swapped for a placeholder.
What you can hold back
- Client files. Not included.
- Taxpayer data. Out.
- Proprietary methods or pricing. Hold back any folder, tool or period.
What happens next
Once you send the estimate form, a License Your Data specialist calls within minutes to set up a 15-minute call under NDA. License Your Data then prepares a de-identified copy of what you put in scope. A sample comes to you for approval first. Only then do buyers license the copy.
What owners ask us
- Who sets the scope?
- Your practice and its counsel. You approve a sample before anything goes out.
- Is that first call kept confidential?
- Yes. An NDA covers everything from the start.
- Do we need to get anything ready?
- Nothing. Just know which tools your team works in and about how long. You will not be asked to export anything.
- Is there a charge for us?
- No. There is no cost to you.