The sentence structure of 内容を必ず確認のうえ

Question

内容を必ず確認のうえ、平成29年度の申告書を作成してくだ さい。

I noticed that 内容を必ず確認のうえ is used quite frequently in banks' websites and financial documents, like in the above example. It must be something simple and well understood, but I have difficulty reconciling the structure of the sentence:

1. Why the direct object 内容を does not have any verb?
2. Why the adverb 必ず is used before a noun?
3. What does のうえ refer to? I cannot relate anything in the contents of the document.

Is 確認 kind of an abbreviation of 確認する here and could possibly answer questions 1 and 2?

Answer 1

確認 is technically a noun, but it is behaving as a verb in this sentence. If the sentence ended after the first part, you might say 内容を確認する。The noun 確認 and the verb する combine to act as a single word.

必ず is being used to say "make sure you check the content"

のうえ is usually used in more formal situations, it comes after a verb and is a conjunction meaning " having done (verb)".

The example sentence you gave would be something along the lines of "Once you've made sure to check the contents, please then fill out the 2017 declaration form."

Answer 2

I believe 確認 is the verb for 内容を, and the のうえ part sounds like a short form of the 〜上で pattern which can be used to mean "after doing ~" (I wrote a short article about that pattern here)

So I think you could rephrase the first part of the above sentence as:

内容を必ず確認した上で...

So a rough translation of the whole sentence would be

Please write your 2017 returns after verifying the content.

I think "the content" here would depend on the context around this phrase, but I am guessing they are just asking you to check your information before filling out a form.

As for the location of the adverb 必ず, Japanese order of words such as this has some freedom, and I think it could go before the 内容を part as well. However I think it is natural in it's current location. But I think if you think of 確認 as short form for 確認する (as you mentioned), it will make more sense.

(UPDATE: changed する上で to a more natural した上で)