New client onboarding checklist for accountants and bookkeepers: 23 steps from conflict check to the first referral.
Before the engagement, access and information, expectations in writing, and the first 30 days. PDF to print, Excel to track with owner, date and a done count. Free, no email required.
What should an accountant’s new client onboarding checklist include?
Four stages. Before you accept: conflict check, AML/CFT customer due diligence, scope and fees agreed, engagement letter signed, professional clearance from the previous accountant. Access: tax agent linking in myIR, software and bank feeds, payroll, prior year records, opening balances agreed. Expectations in writing: a named contact, a stated response time, the monthly cut-off, a deadline calendar, how to send documents. First 30 days: chart of accounts tidied, first month closed on the date promised, a check-in call, and a referral ask after the first milestone. Across 6,190 positive publicly posted reviews of NZ accounting and bookkeeping practices, being easy to reach is praised in 42.5% and responsiveness in 29.4%, while referral language appears in 55.4%. The third stage of this checklist is where those numbers are earned.
The job this document is doing.
- —The client signed in March and the myIR tax agent link was still missing at GST time
- —Nobody told the client when their receipts were due, so every month starts with a chase
- —The previous accountant was never written to and the opening balances do not agree
- —A delighted client is never asked for a referral because there was no step for it
Open it and use it today.
- 01Before the engagement: conflict check, AML/CFT due diligence, fee proposal, engagement letter, professional clearance
- 02Access and information: myIR, software roles, bank feeds, payroll, prior year records, registries, opening balances
- 03Expectations in writing: named contact, response time, monthly cut-off, deadline calendar, how to send documents, fees confirmed
- 04First 30 days: chart of accounts, first close on time, week-four call, 12-month deadline calendar, referral ask
- 05Excel version: Yes, No or N/A dropdown, owner, date, notes and a done count
Free to use and adapt for your own business. Not legal advice: check contract terms against your own terms of trade and, where it matters, with a lawyer.
Why this document, and not another one.
| Measure (NZ accounting and bookkeeping) | Figure |
|---|---|
| Accessibility (easy to reach) praised, positive reviews | 42.5% |
| Responsiveness praised, positive reviews | 29.4% |
| Referral language in positive reviews | 55.4% |
| Deadline reliability praised, positive reviews | 3.1% |
| Unresponsive, negative reviews | About 4% |
From 7,571 publicly posted customer reviews of 484 NZ accounting and bookkeeping practices, collected October 2026. Each review carries a single star rating: 4 or 5 stars counted as positive (n=6,190), 2 stars or fewer as negative (n=328, reported as rank order rather than precision, so negative-review figures are rounded). Praise and complaint traits were coded against a fixed taxonomy; no business is named. Full corpus, method and thresholds: the accounting & bookkeeping methodology page. Full findings: the accounting & bookkeeping research study.
Use it alongside
Bookkeeping pricing and fee proposal template
A two-page proposal: what you understand about the client’s business, the scope line by line, three packages side by side, one-off set-up, exclusions, how fees change, payment terms and acceptance.
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