A company had one employee who processed and stored all payroll and commissions data on one laptop. Now keep in mind this laptop also had multiple users and functions. The company had a sporadic, at best, backup to the server routine. And for over three years, most of the "backups" being done were to the local laptop. (Yes, we shook our heads too.)
Well the day before the company’s scheduled payroll cycle, the laptop crashed. The operating system was absolutely useless and completely unfixable leaving the company in serious trouble. Attempting to save them from disaster we installed the financial software on a desktop at company’s office; but restoring the data wasn't going to be that simple. Importing the most recent backup from their server, (which was over six weeks old) would leave them with less than 30 hours to re-enter six weeks worth of data to meet their payroll deadline.
It sounds just dreadful, doesn’t it? Well…have no fear! Spiderhost to the rescue…again! Our dedicated tech took the laptop home and worked through the night. He removed the hard drive, read it without reinstalling the Windows and transferred as many files as he could to one of our servers. The next morning, he walked the company through the process of uploading all their files dating back to the day of the crash to the replacement PC in their office.
It was down to the wire, but the deadline was met, payroll was saved….end of story, right? Well…close…The tech – knowing how extremely vital proper backups are - had to stress the importance of a strong backup policy and gave the company some helpful steps to take to ensure something like this never happened again.
What happened to the laptop, you ask? Well the tech stress tested the hard drive, scanned it for errors, reinstalled Windows XP and returned it to the company clean and working the next day. We just love stories with happy endings…don’t you?
