Offboard a client

Offboarding ends an agency engagement in order. You decide everything in a six-step wizard, schedule it, and Fabrik Analytics carries it out on the effective date. This article covers the wizard and the summary page. For the timeline afterwards, and what the client sees, read What happens when a client leaves.

Before you start

• You need a staff role that can add clients and see agency finance (by default the owner and directors).
• Agree the last service date and the effective offboarding date with the client. The effective date is the first day you no longer work for them.
• Set your agency's farewell email once in Settings, Offboarding email. Every offboarding uses it.
• If the client's Meta Ads or Google Ads sync on your agency's connection, tell them they will need to connect their own.

Open the wizard

Any of these opens it:

• Clients, the Offboarding tab, New offboarding, then pick the brand. A brand that already has an offboarding in flight is not listed.
• Clients, the brand's row menu, Begin offboarding.
• Inside the brand, Settings, Brand, End the engagement, Begin brand offboarding.
• On the client's contract, terminating the contract and choosing Continue.

Each step saves when you choose Save & continue, so you can leave and come back.

1. Reason & timing

Choose the Reason (Mutual end of contract, Client-initiated early termination, Agency-initiated early termination, Non-payment or Service paused / strategic), whether the notice period was honoured, the Last service date and the Effective offboarding date. Add a Notice note if useful.

2. Settlement

Every open invoice for the client, and any new charge, is listed. Choose an action per line:

• Collect: bill it, or keep it owed.
• Write off: forgive it, kept on record.
• Void invoice: cancel it in Zoho Books. Invoices dated after the last service date start as Void.
• Exclude: leave it out.

The last service month's commission shows as a row of its own. It is raised as usual by the monthly run on the 1st of the following month, from final figures, so choose Raise as usual or Write off; it is never charged twice. An early termination fee and a pro-rata final retainer are worked out from the contract, and you can adjust them.

Under When to raise the new final invoice, choose When the offboarding is scheduled (within the hour) or Wait until this invoice is paid and pick that invoice. The totals show New charges to invoice, Existing invoices to collect, Invoices to void on schedule, Written off and Client still owes.

3. Handover

• Hand ownership to: a person on the client's side who becomes the brand's billing and access owner, or Leave with existing brand owner.
• Disconnect integrations on handover: leave this off unless the client asked for a clean disconnect.
• Handover notes (internal).
• Meta and Google Ads data: for each platform, whether it syncs on the brand's own connection (it carries on) or on your agency's connection (it stops), and the date it stops. Choose Copy link and send the client the link to its integrations page so it can connect its own accounts in time.

4. Billing transition

• Grace period (days): how long the client keeps full access with nothing to pay. 30 by default, up to 90.
• After the grace period: Downgrade to Free (30-day lookback) or Brand self-serves, keep plan if a card is added. Either way the brand moves to Free at the end of the grace period unless it has chosen a plan of its own. Agency keeps paying (special arrangement) sends no billing emails and does not move the brand to Free; agree it with Fabrik first, because nothing bills your agency for it automatically.

5. Farewell email

Check Who it goes to (filled from your agency's rule: the client's main contact as To, others as Cc), add an optional personal note and send yourself a test. The email itself is sent from the summary page once the offboarding is scheduled.

6. Confirm & schedule

Check the summary, including the Closing report, which is created as a draft for you to finish. Choose Schedule offboarding.

At that moment:

• invoices you marked Void invoice are voided in Zoho Books straight away;
• a final invoice set to raise on scheduling is raised within the hour;
• the brand is flagged as offboarding, and a banner on its pages shows the days to the effective date;
• you land on the offboarding's summary, on its farewell email.

The summary page

Open it from Clients, Offboarding, or the banner's Open summary. It shows the dates, the final invoice and charges, and the Handover action log. Its buttons:

• Edit: back to the wizard, until the final invoice has been raised.
• Farewell email: review and Send now. It goes once.
• Generate client data export: run it before the effective date, while your team can still reach the brand.
• Run handover now: carry out the handover today instead of waiting. Resume handover after a failure, Check now while it waits for the final commission.
• Revoke agency access: after the handover completes, removes any access your agency's people still hold on the brand.
• Cancel offboarding: for a draft, scheduled or in progress offboarding. An unsent final invoice is taken back. Invoices already voided stay void, a farewell email already sent stays sent, the closing report is kept, and steps the handover already took are not reversed.

Troubleshooting

• "No brand can start an offboarding: each has one in progress.": open the existing offboarding instead.
• "Zoho Books could not be reached": invoices could not be checked against Zoho. Try again, or reconnect Zoho Books under Settings, Integrations.
• The action log shows a failed step: fix the cause it names, then choose Resume handover. Steps already done are not repeated.
• "Void failed for {invoice}" after scheduling: void that invoice in Zoho Books, or leave it; the handover tries again on the effective date.