The TSA explainer defines the agreement, and the TSA exit guide covers what happens to data when services stop. This page answers the one question an integration advisor should ask before access ends, and shows how the answer splits across roles.
Who can preserve an approved inventory before access arrangements expire?
The record owner named in the purchase agreement can approve an inventory; the person who can actually preserve it is whoever holds admin rights on the systems the seller still runs. Those are often two different people in two different companies, and that split is why the question gets missed.
During a TSA, the carved-out business works inside the seller's email tenant, ERP instance or file shares. The buyer owns the business but may not hold admin rights to the systems that store its history. The seller's admins hold the keys but have no reason to keep records for a business they have sold. When the TSA schedule ends, cutover plans tend to move what the new company needs on Day 1: active mailboxes, open orders, current customers. Closed projects, resolved cases and departed employees' mailboxes can be left in the seller's tenant by default.
Microsoft's own documentation shows how narrow a migration can be. Its cross-tenant mailbox migration moves mailbox data only, and after a successful move the source mailbox is deleted and replaced by a mail-routing object in the old tenant. SharePoint, OneDrive and Teams content need separate planning. If a mailbox was never put in a migration batch, nothing in that process carries it across.
SharePoint
OneDriveThe opening question, and four metadata follow-ups
Start with the exact question: "Who can preserve an approved inventory before access arrangements expire?" It asks about ownership and timing, not about the data itself, so the owner can answer it without opening a single file.
If the answer is a name and a date, follow with four metadata questions:
- What: which record sets sit in systems the seller still runs (closed tickets, project files, quote histories, inactive mailboxes)?
- How much and how long: roughly how many records, over how many years?
- Which system: a plain-text tool name and whose tenant it lives in.
- Who owns it: does the purchase agreement transfer these records, or are they excluded or shared?
Stop there. Partners never ask for exports, screenshots, samples or logins. The answers are a few lines of notes, enough to tell whether an introduction makes sense.
Owner, keeper and admin: an illustrative carve-out
Illustrative only; the business and sequence are fictional. A 240-person industrial distribution business is carved out of a larger group. Its TSA covers email, the ERP and a shared service-desk tool for nine months after closing. Asking the page's question splits the answer into roles the owner can name in a few minutes.
| Role | Who holds it here | What they can do before access expires | What they cannot do |
|---|---|---|---|
| Record owner | Buyer's CFO, under the purchase agreement's "books and records" clause | Approve which record sets should be listed and kept | Reach the seller's tenant directly |
| Rights check | Buyer's counsel | Confirm whether resolved service tickets are transferred, excluded or licensed back | Approve the inventory alone |
| Keeper | Buyer's IT lead | Request an export of the approved sets through the TSA service desk | Decide what is in scope |
| Seller admin | The group's tenant administrator | Run the export the TSA allows, before the service schedule ends | Keep records for a business the group has sold |
| Integration advisor | You | Ask the question, record the answers as metadata, introduce if the owner opts in | See, hold or move any record |
In this example the owner's answer was: the CFO approves, the IT lead preserves through the seller's admin, and counsel confirms the tickets first. About 60 former-staff mailboxes and eight years of resolved service tickets sat outside the first migration batch, so that one answer was what kept them from being left in the seller's tenant by default. The records never left the company's control.
What happens if nobody is named
If the owner cannot name a keeper, the default applies: records outside the cutover scope stay in systems the seller is about to retire. For a Microsoft 365 for business subscription that lapses, Microsoft describes Expired and Disabled stages; during Disabled only admins can reach and back up data, and the standard Disabled period for most offers is 90 days before deletion. Enterprise and partner-purchased agreements can differ, so the real dates come from the tenant's own admin and the TSA schedule, never from a rule of thumb.
How do you raise the reward and get the owner's permission?
Only after the keeper question is answered, and only as an option. Ask whether the owner would like to hear whether the records could be licensed for AI training, then disclose plainly that you may receive a referral reward from SourceX if a license completes.
The disclosure should say three things: that SourceX funds any reward separately, that it never reduces the company's payout, and that a lead, meeting or signature alone does not trigger payment. The rewards page has the wording. Get the owner's permission to introduce in writing, and introduce only the person who can authorize a licensing discussion: the CEO, rather than the keeper or a record owner who reports to them.
Keep the introduction itself short: the access event, the authorized contact, and a statement that no records have been shared. Attach nothing and quote no counts the owner has not given you. If the owner declines, the conversation still did its job: someone now owns the inventory before access ends.
Which companies qualify, and what stays unknown until SourceX reviews?
The introduced company needs 50+ full-time employees at peak (contractors excluded), a documented operating history, rights to license the records and an authorized contact. Companies in the U.S., Canada and the EU qualify, as do companies in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, India, Singapore, South Africa, Latin America, the UAE and Saudi Arabia when at least 70% of the data is in English.
In a carve-out, check headcount for the separated business itself, not the seller group. Partners sign the Channel Partner Agreement before submitting introductions. The who qualifies page lists the full criteria.
| Known before introduction | Unknown until SourceX reviews |
|---|---|
| Which record sets exist and in whose tenant | Whether the records are selected for any dataset |
| Approximate volume and years covered | The outcome of the rights review |
| Who owns them under the purchase agreement | The company's offer and agreed terms |
| Who can authorize a licensing discussion | Whether any reward becomes payable |
If the purchase agreement leaves record ownership unclear, raise that before the introduction; the seller transition period guide covers the seller's side, and the CFO checklist for a data licensing agreement covers what the finance lead will review later. More role playbooks sit on the partner hub.
Go deeper on TSA expiry
- Transition service agreement expiry meeting agenda: a timed 15-minute agenda for the owner conversation, from the exit schedule to the opt-in.
- Transition service agreement expiry archive context checklist: a checklist of the TSA dates, cutover scope, seller retention and ownership facts to verify before access ends.
- Transition service agreement expiry introduction email: a short email template for introducing the authorized contact to SourceX, with the disclosure included.
Next step
Refer a company. No cap on rewards. Default reward on a company's first qualifying transaction: the greater of $50,000 plus 5% and 15% of Actual Supplier Payout, with no cap; further qualifying transactions first agreed within 12 months of the first Closing pay 15%. Eligibility and payment conditions apply, including the USD 100,000 Minimum Transaction, and a signed Schedule A or addendum can differ. A lead, meeting or signature alone does not trigger payment.
If your next TSA exit leaves a records gap and the owner wants to explore it, register as a partner, check the company against who qualifies, and read the program terms before you send the introduction.