Bookkeeping services agreement

About this bookkeeping agreement

This agreement sets out the relationship between a bookkeeping company and a client business. The bookkeeping company is likely to provide a range of services, from record keeping to accounts preparation, financial forecasting, budgeting and management reporting.

The document is suitable for one-off project work, such as putting a new accounting system in place, or for on-going service provision.

Key features of this document

Intellectual property protection

The most striking feature of this agreement is the optional provision for the license of intellectual property developed by the bookkeeping company. You are likely to develop tools that save you time, or allow your client to work without you. These might be report templates, or spreadsheets containing macros, or a process for collecting data. This IP is valuable (if only at the replacement cost of time), so you should make sure that you own the rights to it, and can reuse it for other clients. This contract contains provisions that ensure that IP developed in the course of working for a client remains yours, and not your client's. Your client will be aware that when the contract terminates, he loses the benefit of the use of the IP.

Limitation of liability

A limitation of liability provision sets out the boundaries of your responsibilities and it should limit the amount of damages that the client can seek. We include tough terms to help ensure that your client does not pursue you for something for which you were not responsible.

Similar documents

This document is for a company. If you are a sole trader, you will a contract for services that emphasises that you are self-employed. See our bookkeeping terms and conditions template.

If you offer business consultancy services as well, you might consider using one of our consultancy agreements in place of this agreement for those services.

You may also need employment contracts for your employees who carry out the bookkeeping work. See our standard employment contract.

Contents

This document includes provisions relating to:

• Details of the parties
• Detailed description of the work required
• Payment and hours worked
• Warranties
• Confidentiality
• Limitation of liability
• Licence of intellectual property
• Hours to be worked
• Termination
• Dispute resolution
• Other legal provisions
• Explanatory notes and guidance