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Ask about review, not just delivery
Who checks the work? If one person prepares and no one reviews, errors reach your financial statements. Ask explicitly how segregation of duties is handled.
Ask what happens when something is unclear
Every set of books has ambiguous transactions. The right answer is a documented query process, not a guess buried in a miscellaneous account.
Ask about access and data handling
Understand which systems the provider needs, at what permission level, and how documents are exchanged. Read-only access and secure file sharing should be the default.
Ask what the deliverable is
'Bookkeeping' means different things to different providers. Get the specific list of reports, deadlines and reconciliations in writing before you sign anything.
