A firm should say plainly where it can serve clients, how meetings and document exchange work without an office visit, how it handles signatures and identity checks at a distance, and when an in-person meeting is still available. Registration and licensing decide the where, and the rules differ for investment advisers, CPAs, and enrolled agents, so the compliance owner confirms the list of states before it appears on the page.
Some financial firms work mostly by video and portal, with clients spread across several states. Their websites often lag behind: an office address in the footer, a photo of the conference room, a contact form that asks for a preferred meeting time and nothing else. Other sites go the other way and announce "serving clients nationwide" without anyone checking whether the firm can.
Owners and marketing leads at financial, accounting and tax firms can use this to plan remote-client pages. It is not legal advice, and the firm's compliance officer, ethics partner, or counsel decides where the firm may serve clients.
Remote does not mean anywhere
Each kind of firm answers the where question differently. Working remotely is not the same as being permitted everywhere, and the page should reflect the firm's actual registrations and licenses.
| Firm type | What decides where it can serve | Who confirms |
|---|---|---|
| Investment adviser | The SEC says "RAUM and activities dictate if they must register with the SEC or one or more state securities regulators," and smaller advisers "Register with each state where the adviser meets that state's threshold for number of clients in that state." | Chief compliance officer |
| CPA firm | NASBA describes mobility as "a practice privilege that generally permits licensed CPAs in good standing" from a substantially equivalent state to practice outside their principal place of business, and points CPAs to CPAmobility.org to learn "whether mobility applies to their specific situation." | Ethics partner, against each state board's rules |
| Enrolled agent | The IRS says enrolled agents are "unrestricted as to which taxpayers they can represent, what types of tax matters they can handle," before the IRS | The practice owner, separately for any state tax work |
| Bookkeeper | The firm's own capacity, plus any state rules for tax or payroll work it also offers | Owner |
The page can then say something specific: the states where the firm's advisers are registered, the states where it prepares returns, or that its federal representation work is available to taxpayers anywhere in the country. A short list that is right beats a long one nobody checked.
Describe the meeting, not just the video link
A prospect who has never met the firm wants to picture the first conversation. Say how it happens (video, phone, or either), roughly how long it runs, whether a spouse or business partner can join from another location, whether the firm records meetings, and how scheduling handles time zones. If the firm shares its screen to walk through a plan or a return, say so; it tells the prospect what the meeting will feel like.
The people who run those meetings know what remote prospects need to hear. A practice owner can ask the team, "If someone three states away booked a first meeting tomorrow, what would they need to know that our website does not tell them?" The answers usually include document exchange, signatures, and whether the firm ever meets in person, which the next sections cover.
Say what changes for a remote client and what does not. Fees, engagement letters, and review cycles are often identical for remote and local clients, and the page can say so if that is true. Where something differs, such as meetings offered only during certain hours for clients in distant time zones, or annual reviews held by video unless the client asks otherwise, state it as the firm's policy in the same words the engagement letter uses.
Signatures and identity, in the IRS's terms
Tax practices can describe remote authorizations using the IRS's own process. The IRS lets practitioners submit Forms 2848 and 8821 online, and for forms submitted that way it accepts electronic signatures, while "For security reasons, all forms mailed or faxed to the IRS must have a "wet" ink signature." The IRS says the practitioner must authenticate the taxpayer's identity when both of two conditions apply (no personal or business relationship with the taxpayer, and the taxpayer signs electronically in a remote transaction), with steps such as inspecting a valid government-issued photo ID, and it calls authentication a best practice whenever the practitioner does not know the taxpayer.
That gives the page something concrete: the firm will ask a new remote client to show a photo ID on a video call before signing authorizations, if that is the firm's actual practice. Advisers and CPA firms have their own onboarding steps, and the person who runs onboarding confirms each one. Document exchange belongs on a related page about how the firm's client portal works, linked from here.
Fictional example: an enrolled agent and bookkeeping firm in Vermont
A fictional firm in Vermont has two enrolled agents and a small bookkeeping team. Most of its clients are small businesses in other states that found it through a trade association. Its site says "Vermont's trusted tax team," shows the office, and never mentions that most clients have never visited.
The firm rewrites its about and services pages around how it actually works. The new pages say that its enrolled agents represent taxpayers before the IRS regardless of state, list the states for which it prepares state returns, explain that bookkeeping is delivered entirely online, and describe the first video meeting and the ID check before signatures. The writer should not have to invent which state returns the firm prepares or guess how it verifies identity; the owner provides the state list and the onboarding checklist, and both are reviewed every spring.
Keep the list of states current
A remote practice's service area changes when the firm registers in a new state, a CPA moves, or an advisor leaves. Give the states list an owner, and update the website, the firm's Google Business Profile, and any directory listings on the same day. Say whether the firm still meets in person, where, and how to arrange it, since some remote clients want one meeting a year at a table.
In Hudson South's process, Authority Asset gathers the firm's approved business knowledge and evidence, including registrations, licenses, and onboarding steps. Hudson Twenty-One records how the firm communicates across 21 dimensions, so a video-first practice still sounds like its people. Market Intelligence researches what prospects in the firm's markets ask, and AEO Creation turns those inputs into answer-first content.
See how remote-first competitors explain themselves
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- Investment Advisers. U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Read 2026-10-16.
- Mobility. National Association of State Boards of Accountancy. Read 2026-10-16.
- Enrolled agent information. Internal Revenue Service. Read 2026-10-16.
- Submit Forms 2848 and 8821 online. Internal Revenue Service. Read 2026-10-16.