Yearend backup to accountant

I work in an accounting office.  For years, it has been our practice to ask clients for a copy of their latest .cab file when we do their yearend.  This is an ordinary .cab file, made using the usual backup procedure.  We are not asking for an 'accountant version' of the data.  We import their accounting data into our software and prepare the yearend.  If there are adjusting entries, the client keys them into their live data.

In the past month or so, a few clients have told us "I cannot give you a copy of a .cab file because giving you a copy of a .cab file will make my live data not work any more"  Sometimes, the reasoning is 'that would invalidate my licence'.  Most of our clients have continued to send us .cab files and there haven't been any problems.

I can't think of any way that sending us a copy of a .cab file would do anything at all, harmful or otherwise, to the client's live data.  Am I missing something?  Is there a situation I need to be aware of where we could accidentally be lousing things up for the client?

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    Hi @C White,

    Thanks for reaching out. Did you ever find an answer for this issue? If by clients saying, 

    giving you a copy of a .cab file will make my live data not work any more

    you mean they have their data shared using Remote Data Access, then the option of sharing the live company file for use by an accountant with the Sage 50 CA Accountants Edition is available. See KB 105521 Remote Data Access - Setup multi-users for details on how to invite users (like an accountant) to access a shared a company data file using Remote Data access. 

    As of the 2021.2 version of Sage 50 CA (recently released) users with company data shared via Remote Data Access can easily switch to "single-user mode" which would allow them to create a .cab backup from the File menu > Backup. This method is also applicable to your clients who are not using Sage 50cloud, just a regular box version from retail that comes with no subscription or cloud connected services. See KB 108531 for more details.

    The backup .cab file would become separate from a live shared data file via RDA, creation of the .cab file won't affect the RDA file. If the.cab is just to be used as a reference for creation of adjusting journal entries, those adjusting JEs can be recreated in a live file.

    Warm Regards,

    Erzsi