Before hiring a development agency in Mexico, confirm that it is a registered company, that the people you will work with speak English well and work your hours, and that the contract assigns intellectual property to you in writing. Keep code, domains and accounts in your company’s name, agree on milestone payments in US dollars, and ask for a CFDI invoice for exported services plus a W-8BEN-E for your files. The 15 points below turn that into a step-by-step review.
- Verify the company: tax registration, address and real references from US or Canadian clients.
- Interview the delivery team, not only sales, and agree on overlap hours in writing.
- Get a written IP assignment that works under Mexican and US or Canadian law.
- Own your repository, domain, hosting and ad accounts from day one.
- Pay by milestones in USD against a proper CFDI invoice.
Before you start: why a checklist helps
Hiring an agency in Mexico is not harder than hiring one in Ohio or Ontario, but the details are different: another tax system, another copyright law, and invoices that look nothing like a US invoice. A short checklist keeps those differences from turning into surprises six months in.
We grouped the 15 points into four parts: the company and communication, process and quality, contracts and IP, and money. If you are still deciding whether nearshore is right for you at all, start with nearshore web development in Mexico: what US businesses should know.
| Part | Points | What it protects |
|---|---|---|
| Company and communication | 1–4 | That you are dealing with a real, reachable team |
| Process and quality | 5–8 | That the work arrives on time and holds up |
| Contracts and IP | 9–12 | That you own what you paid for |
| Money and taxes | 13–15 | That payments and paperwork are clean on both sides |
Use it to compare two or three agencies side by side. Send each one the same written questions, give them a few days to answer, and score the replies. The way an agency handles a structured review before you pay anything is a fair preview of how it will handle your project. None of this replaces advice from your own attorney and accountant, but it will make those conversations shorter and cheaper.
Company and communication (points 1–4)
1. Verify that the company exists
Ask for the company’s legal name and its RFC (Mexico’s taxpayer ID). A registered company can show its tax status certificate, the constancia de situación fiscal. Check the physical address and how long they have been operating.
2. Test the English of the people you will work with
Salespeople often speak excellent English; what matters is the project manager and lead developer. Ask for a call with both before signing, and send a written question to see how they reply.
3. Agree on overlap hours in writing
Most of Mexico runs on UTC−6 all year and has not used daylight saving time since 2022. That means the same time as US Central in winter and one hour behind it in summer. Write down which hours the team is available for calls and how fast urgent issues get a response.
4. Check live work and real references
Ask for URLs of live projects, not screenshots, and for two references from clients in the US or Canada. Call them and ask what went wrong and how the agency handled it.
Process and quality (points 5–8)
5. Find out who does the work
Ask whether the developers are employees or subcontractors. Subcontracting is not automatically bad, but you need to know who has access to your code and data, and the contract should cover them too.
6. Review their process
A good agency explains discovery, written specifications, a staging site for review, acceptance criteria and regular demos. If the answer is “we just start building”, expect scope arguments later.
7. Ask how code quality is checked
Look for version control in a repository you can see, code reviews before changes go live, basic automated tests for critical features and documentation you can hand to another developer.
8. Ask about security and data handling
Ask how they store passwords (a password manager, not spreadsheets), whether they use two-factor authentication, who gets production access and how backups work. If you handle health data, US privacy rules such as HIPAA apply and you will need the right agreements; Canadian clients should ask about PIPEDA and provincial privacy laws.
Contracts and IP (points 9–12)
9. Choose governing law and dispute resolution
Decide which law governs the contract and where disputes are resolved. Many cross-border agreements use the client’s state or province, or international arbitration. Have your attorney review it; a template from the internet is not enough.
10. Get a written IP assignment that works in both countries
The US concept of “work made for hire” does not carry over neatly to an outside company in Mexico. Mexican copyright law distinguishes economic rights, which can be transferred, from moral rights, which stay with the author. Transfers of economic rights must be in writing, and Mexican law has its own rules on their duration, so ask counsel who knows Mexican law to draft an assignment that covers code, designs and content explicitly. List any pre-existing tools or open-source components the agency uses and how they are licensed.
11. Keep every account in your company’s name
Domain, hosting, code repository, Google Analytics, Search Console, ad accounts, app store developer accounts and payment gateways should all belong to you, with the agency added as a user.
12. Plan the exit before you begin
Include a handover clause: documentation, credentials, a final copy of everything and a set number of hours of transition help if you end the relationship.
Money and taxes (points 13–15)
13. Ask for a CFDI invoice in USD
Mexican companies invoice through the CFDI electronic system. For a foreign client, the agency issues the invoice using a generic foreign RFC, and services exported abroad can qualify for a 0% VAT rate when legal requirements are met. You receive a PDF and an XML file; keep both. An agency that cannot issue a CFDI is a warning sign.
14. Agree on payment terms and method
Pay in US dollars by wire, ACH to a USD account or a service like Wise. Tie payments to milestones (for example: deposit, design approved, staging approved, launch) instead of paying everything up front, and spell out what happens if a milestone slips.
15. Collect the right tax paperwork on your side
A US company paying a foreign vendor normally collects a W-8BEN-E instead of a W-9, and services performed entirely outside the US generally do not trigger a 1099. Canadian businesses should ask their accountant whether they need to self-assess GST/HST on imported services. Confirm all of this with your own CPA, since your situation may differ.
Questions to ask in the first call
Copy these into your notes and ask every agency on your shortlist:
- Who exactly will work on my project, and can I meet them?
- What hours will you be available, and in which time zone is your team?
- Can you share two live projects for US or Canadian clients, and a reference I can call?
- Where will the code live, and who owns the accounts?
- How do you handle scope changes and extra requests?
- What happens after launch: support, updates, backups?
- How do you invoice foreign clients, and in what currency?
Ask them in the same order every time so the answers are easy to compare. Clear, specific answers in writing are a good sign. Vague answers in the sales stage rarely get clearer once the project starts.
After you sign: the first 30 days
- Week 1. Kickoff call, shared folder, access to your accounts with individual logins, agreed channel for daily questions.
- Week 2. Written specification or sitemap approved by you. This is the cheapest moment to change your mind.
- Week 3. First designs or a working prototype on a staging site.
- Week 4. First milestone review against the acceptance criteria in the contract.
If the project includes a bilingual site, automation or AI search work, our guides on bilingual websites, lead follow-up automation and AI search optimization will help you write a sharper brief.
How we handle these points
We are a registered company based in Torreón, Coahuila, working on central Mexico time all year. We invoice US and Canadian clients in dollars with a proper CFDI, keep code and accounts in the client’s name and put the IP assignment in writing. You can read more about how we embed developers with your team on our nearshore development page, get a rough scope with our website estimator (in Spanish), or send us your checklist and we will answer each point in writing.
