Data Recovery Case File · Trust, Practice & Honest Limits · Define It Before You Commit
Success Should Be Defined by the Owner Before the Work Rather Than by the Provider After It
His enquiry asks the question the industry answers least clearly. Around 130GB of documents required from a work laptop, where the company's own attempt recovered roughly 3GB, and he asks: "your website states no fix no fee — what does your company define a fix as? A partial recovery, although better than nothing, is not wholly useful to me." He is right to ask, and the answer should be his to set.
| Media | Hard drive from a work laptop with filesystem corruption — approximately 130GB of document content required; approximately 3GB recovered by a prior attempt |
| Reported situation | Work laptop developing filesystem corruption · approximately 130GB of document content required · preliminary recovery performed by the owner's employer · approximately 3GB recovered by that attempt · definition of success under a no-fee-on-failure arrangement queried before commitment |
| Fault class | Structural damage with limited prior extraction — prior result establishing partial readability; success criterion to be defined by the owner in advance |
| Equipment used | Success criterion agreed in writing with the owner before work was commissioned · prior partial result used to establish a floor and to identify which regions failed · imaged write-blocked under strict per-sector timeouts with readable regions taken first · filesystem structures interpreted with their duplicate copies · outcome measured against the agreed criterion before any invoice |
The decode: why the question matters, and how it should be answered
Why the phrase is ambiguous by nature: a fee arrangement conditional on success requires success to be defined, and the definition is usually left unstated. A provider recovering one file has technically recovered something, and nothing in the phrase prevents that being called a fix.
Why that ambiguity is not usually deliberate: most recoveries are all or nothing, and the question rarely arises. It arises precisely in cases like his, where partial results are likely.
How it should be settled, and this is the substantive answer: by the owner, in advance, in writing. He states what would make the work worth paying for, and that becomes the criterion — not a definition supplied afterwards by whoever is invoicing.
Why he is well placed to state it: he knows what the 130GB contains and which parts matter. A criterion expressed as particular folders, or a proportion, or specific files, is a concrete test that both sides can measure against.
Why a proportion alone is a poor criterion: ninety per cent of a document set can be worthless if the missing tenth is the current work. Naming the material that matters is better than naming a percentage.
What his employer's result already establishes, and it is useful: the drive reads in part. Three gigabytes recovered means the device functions and some regions return, which excludes a wholly dead drive.
Why that result is also informative about method: a preliminary recovery run through the operating system reaches what the filesystem still describes. A yield of three gigabytes from a hundred and thirty suggests the structures are largely gone rather than the content.
Why that distinction is encouraging: a directory-following approach stops where the directory stops. Content located by signature does not need the directory at all, and it frequently returns far more than a first attempt.
What should be established before any of it: whether the employer holds a backup of the documents. A work machine's content is frequently duplicated centrally, and that question costs nothing.
Why the honest position is worth stating alongside the criterion: if the agreed test cannot realistically be met, that should be said before the work rather than discovered at the end. A criterion is only useful if both parties expect it to be achievable.
On the bench
The success criterion was agreed in writing with the owner before work was commissioned — a conditional fee arrangement requiring success to be defined, which is usually left unstated because most recoveries are all or nothing, so the question arises precisely where partial results are likely. A criterion expressed as named material is a concrete test, whereas a proportion may be satisfied while omitting what matters. The prior partial result was used to establish a floor and identify which regions failed.
The outcome
The success criterion agreed in writing before work was commissioned, the prior result used to establish a floor, and the outcome measured against the agreed criterion before any invoice. Free assessment, one fixed written figure including VAT; where a drive has to be opened, 50% of parts and labour is payable upfront with the balance only on success — otherwise no recovery, no fee. The decode: you should set the definition, not us. Name the material that would make the work worth paying for, agree it in writing, and have the result measured against that.
Agreeing what success means before you commit
Set the definition yourself and get it in writing, because a conditional fee needs success defined and the definition is usually supplied afterwards by whoever is invoicing. Name the material that would make the work worth paying for — particular folders or specific files — rather than a percentage, since ninety per cent of a document set can be worthless if the missing tenth is your current work. Ask for the honest view on whether that criterion is achievable before starting. And check whether your employer holds a backup first.
Set the criterion yourself — call Manchester Data Recovery on 0161 871 0788; criterion agreed in writing before work is commissioned, prior results used to establish a floor, outcome measured against that criterion before any invoice.
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Our case files are drawn from genuine enquiries received by our laboratory over the past ten years, anonymised to protect client confidentiality. Each one describes the diagnostic and recovery procedure our engineers apply to that fault, using the equipment listed.