The Real Cost of Data Loss

 … and why we should REALLY back-up our files

We know we should back-up our files – family photos, accounts, business files and of course everything else we really cannot afford to lose (like software licenses, emails…).

But am I really at risk of data loss?
So, you’re a “safe surfer”, have first-class Anti-Virus software installed and your computer is only a couple of months old – what could possibly go wrong?!

Anything and everything – you are at risk at all times:

Whether it’s due to accidental deletion or overwriting of individual files, virus attacks (the encryption viruses are still on the increases and your Antivirus programme is always once step behind), theft, fire, or simply – and most commonly – hard drive failure (happens even to new hard drives).

The Real Cost of Data Loss?
We deal with customers suffering from data loss on a REGULAR basis – the distress is certain and real:

  1. Emotional distress

It’s very rare we bear the bad news to a customer and get a response of “oh, that’s ok, there wasn’t anything worth keeping on there anyway”.

The first reaction usually goes more like this…

“I actually feel sick right now”
 “but my accounts are due – what am I going to do”
 “but all my customer files are on there – without them my business is nothing”
 “I could cry, it had photos of my late mother on there”

  1. Financial distress

Then follows the realisation that this isn’t going to be cheap neither.

The first step is of course to try and recover the data – which is often not possible and can be time-consuming and thus expensive – sometimes thousands of pounds and sometimes simply impossible.

Add to this the cost of reinstalling everything: the operating system and all software, printers, scanners, phones etc. – are you sure you have all the licenses to be able to reinstall? If not, you must re-purchase the software and that does not come cheap; i.e. Microsoft Office can cost you hundreds of £££.

Then comes the task of rebuilding business data, accounts (the HMRC is not going to let you get away with it that easily) and anything else you can think of. If you are running your business from this computer, you risk losing orders, even customers and as it is your duty to protect your data, your customers could even sue you.

You are distressed and we feel for you… if only you had backed-up!

Just do it – and do it NOW!
Whether you just copy and paste your files onto a flash drive, into the cloud (i.e. Dropbox) or, even better, image the lot (including programmes) to an external hard drive, just do it!

Best case scenario is of course a combination of all the above.

If you think you cannot afford it, think again. There are plenty of free backup solutions out there, especially in the cloud (OneDrive, Dropbox, Google Drive…) and Windows has its own backup software preinstalled.

And finally…
Most importantly, test your backup to make sure it actually works before you need to use it!

 

 

Have PC Harmony,
so you can concentrate on the more important things in life…

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