I Need Advice To Go Against Adrc

[Kage]

ADRC stands for Adroit Data Recovery Centre Pte Ltd.

It is basically a company that provides data extraction and I had my hard disk sent for data extraction. I went to confirm the data that was extracted and apparently only the files from D drive was attracted. It was the apparent fault of theirs to misread what I have written in my data extraction criteria. They told me that they will prepare the files from C: drive on a later date and I can return to check on it again. I stupidly signed the form on "accepting the job unconditionally", because they assured me that all the files would not have a problem.

In one of the forms that I have filled up on, "It is extremely important that you specify the required files or folders in exact details (such as names, file extensions, sizes etc).

This will be used to benchmark against the recovery success rate. Customer will not be allowed to claim additional or missing data once all the recovered data is delivered as specified here."

What I've written in it, quoted "My documents, picture, music, video folder, webcam and phone/camera taken photos folder. Portfolio folder and all media files from D drive." Which obviously states something different.

Today I received a mail from them,

Hi (My name),

Tried calling you but to no avail.

I am sorry to say that the data from C: drive is no longer recoverable due to the disk deterioration. If you are fine with accepting the data that you viewed at my office last time, we will offer you a 10% discount which will be $1134 + 7%. If you are unable to accept it, you will need to pay me a fix cost of S$250 + 7% for my effort done.

Let me know your decision.

Thanks and regards,

Yimei

What she wrote was true according to the terms and conditions in the quotation section which is below this 12 sets of terms and conditions.

I went back to check on the terms and conditions straight and here are the terms and conditions.

1. The Customer affirms that he/she is the legal rightful owner or representative of all data or data media that is sent to Adroit Data Recovery Centre Pte Ltd for data recovery work and that he/she has legal rights to access all data, information and files therein. Identity and details of customer will need to be verified by proper document such as identity card bearing the photo during job submission on personal basis. The term data media refers to any kinds of digital data storage system such as but not limited to hard disks, optical drives, USB drives, thumb drives, media cards, laptops, desktops, servers or any other forms of computer systems or peripherals. The Customer attests that the recovered data will not be used for any illegal purposes. The Customer further attests that ADRC is not participating in any illegal activity by providing the data recovery service to the Customer.

2. ADRC agrees to keep all submitted information, files and data in strictest confidentiality. Without Customer's consent, ADRC will not disclose, transfer, duplicate, reproduce, retain, resell or in any way use all or any part of the information, files or data submitted to us. Reasonable measures will be taken by ADRC to safeguard and protect all information, files or data while they are in possession of ADRC, and to verify the identity of individuals to whom this information, files or data is released. Exception will be made when there are litigation requirements or disputes under the legal jurisdiction of Singapore whereby all or part of the customer information is needed to be made available.

3. Should ADRC notify the Customer via email about collection of data media but receives no reply, the data media will be scrapped two calender weeks from date of notification. The Customer may write to ADRC to extend the deadline but it will be at the discretion of ADRC to agree on new deadline. By default, ADRC does not accord any commercial value to the Customer's data media which is normally damaged and will only be returned to the Customer upon request. All unclaimed data media,regardless of working conditions and types, for more than three calender months, commencing from date of job submission, will be automatically scrapped, with or without prior notification, for reason of data confidentiality and storage concern. No compensation will be given once the data media is scrapped. All prepaid deposit will also be forfeited.

4. In the case whereby Customers' data media is lost, damaged by fire or any natural disaster while under the custody of ADRC, a maximum compensation of S$200 will be paid. It is agreed that the data could be of high value but such data is no longer accessible under normal circumstances even with the best effort of ADRC. ADRC will not assume any data value in all data media.

5. It is understood that all data media given to us is not in working condition, or may deteriorate suddenly or gradually over time, therefore ADRC will not be responsible for the condition of data media upon returning to the Customer after data recovery or preliminary diagnosis. All data media is treated as "spoilt" or "defective" by default. If the data media is in working condition, Customers must back up all important data before passing the data media to us.

6. All prices and charges associated with the services will be made known to the Customers via fax or email.Customer can not cancel the job upon confirmation of job or else 100% of full quoted price will be charged as penalty. Customer has to ensure that the data media submitted for recovery is indeed the correct media containing the required data. In the event that the job was completed successfully, a full payment will be charged even if the required data is found to exist elsewhere as ADRC is not providing investigation service to find the whereabouts of customer's data.

7. Email, electronic on-line confirmation or fax is taken to be legal binding officially.Phone conversation may be recorded for support or training purposes.

8. If the disk is opened up in ADRC clean lab, a lab seal will be put in place to verify that ADRC has performed the recovery job on the disk. For data media with casings (such as USB drives, thumb drives, media cards, mp3 players etc), ADRC may need to open up or break the casings which may then get damaged as a result. The Customers agree and fully acknowledge such damage without demanding compensation of any kind. Generally there should not be any warranty claim issues but as a service provider, ADRC will not guarantee warranty issues of data media

9. To collect back the original data media at any stage of work, the Customer must inform ADRC at least one business day in advance to make the necessary arrangement.The Customer will be notified after the data media is ready to be returned.

10. ADRC normally does not charge fixed evaluation fee for disk that has failed naturally with intact disk seal. However if the Customer selects to cancel the job after verbal or written quotation or during evaluation, there will be a cancellation fee of S$50 for standard service, S$100 for priority evaluation and S$250 for complex server / RAID systems. Delivery fee (if any) will be additional. If the job consists of multiple disks/server configuration, rush service or in some special case, the Customer will be made known the fee. After evaluation, the follow up quotation will not contain any elaborate details such as graphs, pictures or technical parameters of any kind as the focus of evaluation is merely for ADRC to ascertain the possibility, cost and estimated duration to recover all or part of the required data.

11. Under all circumstances, ADRC will only work on best attempt and will not be responsible for failed or incomplete recovery of data due to its inherent nature. Upon job completion,a file list will be sent to the Customer who has the option to come down to ADRC's office to review the recovered data before accepting the job. Alternatively, verification could be done via sampled files sent through email. To indicate acceptance of job, a Data Acceptance Form must be signed by the Customer before data is delivered. Upon receiving the recovered data, the customer is deemed to have accepted the job unconditionally.

12. Recovered data by ADRC will be purged after 2 calender weeks upon delivering the recovered data to the customers. Any subsequent request to look into the data will be treated as new job. ADRC could keep the recovered data for a longer period provided the Customer makes a request through writing and such request is agreeable by ADRC.

and the terms and conditions for the quotation that is related

You have accepted the quotation details as below: 2. If specified data stated in the Data Recovery Request Form is partially recovered but not accepted by the customer on discounted price, there will be a minimum fixed cost of S$250 to cover the resources spent (eg. due to data corruption or whatever reason).

I really don't know what to do now, I don't wanna pay them a single cent because it was not my fault for the failure to recover all of my data. What should I do?? I need advice! Anyone please!!!

I've replied the mail by saying this (below), but I'm sure they won't let me off that easily. Can someone help me to get around this? I beg of you!

Hi YiMei,

It's regretful to say that I am unwilling to accept either of the choices you have provided. In the first place, the data criteria request I have filed clearly states the information I wanted and the big majority of the important files are located in the C: drive. The misinterpretation of the criteria I've submitted, quoted "My documents, picture, music, video folder, webcam and phone/camera taken photos folder. Portfolio folder and all media files from D drive." was interpreted into extraction of all data files purely from D drive, which is clearly not the fault on my part.

In whichever way it goes, I have not received any of the most crucial data that I have requested and by the misinterpretation/misreading of what I have clearly stated in black and white in the data request, has caused permanent damage and data loss to my data rendering it irretrievable. In fact, is it not a must to attempt to recover every single piece of data found in the hard disk itself? To me it seems like there is a problem in which the engineers/anyone who is involved, to be slackening on their job by only recovering the minimal amount of data. I am hugely disappointed in the big contrast of the quality of the service I have received and I am enraged by the news of my irretrievable data which was permanently damaged and in which I have no fault in.

Under the forth number of the terms and conditions, "4. In the case whereby Customers' data media is lost, damaged by fire or any natural disaster while under the custody of ADRC, a maximum compensation of S$200 will be paid. It is agreed that the data could be of high value but such data is no longer accessible under normal circumstances even with the best effort of ADRC. ADRC will not assume any data value in all data media." my data was not lost in a case of fire or any natural disaster but it was lost due to the negligence and misinterpretation of simple clear English, and I demand a compensation. With the refunding of $15 from the free delivery charges that has not been refunded.

Thanks and regards,

(My name)

Edited July 17, 2012 by kaze

[knight]

hmm,,,your reply back to them seems harsh lol. but their fees also seems pretty high.

I guess you should wait to see what she replies back,

If the data that has currently been extracted is really nothing special you should just let it go.

[Seriphos]

Yup, I guess U cant do much now. Just see what she replies. And if it isnt what u wanted, either ways u cant get the data u wanted anymore, so, if she refuses to compensate, give her that spoilt HD as a gift and ignore the fxxk out of her. DOnt pay her a single cent for a job not done haha xD

[Coolz]

DAFUQ wat effort done sia ! Still need pay Somemore . Can't u like go back to their main office and fxxk them upside down coz its their fault and ask them for compensation like seriously . But it will be difficult ah since u signed e form already . U can try ur luck though but juz don't lose to those idiots

[Kage]

They replied

Hi (my name),

During recovery, my engineer did not see any C: drive so that why they only recover all the data in the D: drive as stated in the request form believing that all the folders stated are located in the D: drive and only upon your request we then know that there is C: drive located in the media.

The disk start to deteriorate during the 2^nd recovery and it crashed before we can even retrieve any data from the C: drive. After much discussion with my management, we decided to treat the job as partial recovery and offer you additional 10% discount. If you are unable to accept the job, you can reject the job but there will be a cost of S$250 + GST you will need to pay for my effort done. This is actually stated in clause 2 of the quotation “If specified data stated in the Data Recovery Request Form is partially recovered but not accepted by the customer on discounted price, there will be a minimum fixed cost of S$250 to cover the resources spent” not the T&Cs.

We did recover the data from D: drive as requested in the request form so this is not consider as no data are being recovered. In regards with the $15, I tried calling you on the day after you left but you did not answer the call so I will refund back to you when you are down for collection of the drive.

Let me know how.

Thanks and regards,

Yimei

[Kage]

hmm,,,your reply back to them seems harsh lol. but their fees also seems pretty high.

I guess you should wait to see what she replies back,

If the data that has currently been extracted is really nothing special you should just let it go.

Idk sia, I was really raging, I swear. I can let go, but I'm definitely not paying them the $250. And yes, the data in it are special to me. Years of pictures taken from all over the world, of myself, my friends and families, my recordings of music/singing, videos, portfolios etc.

[Kage]

Yup, I guess U cant do much now. Just see what she replies. And if it isnt what u wanted, either ways u cant get the data u wanted anymore, so, if she refuses to compensate, give her that spoilt HD as a gift and ignore the fxxk out of her. DOnt pay her a single cent for a job not done haha xD

The thing is, because of the terms and agreements, I'm afraid that I'm under some lawful obligation to pay them the $250. I don't mind giving her that spoil HD and another HD that I have provided to have all data placed into it. They considered the job partially done because part of the D drive data was in it. fxxk sia, partially my arse.

[Kage]

DAFUQ wat effort done sia ! Still need pay Somemore . Can't u like go back to their main office and fxxk them upside down coz its their fault and ask them for compensation like seriously . But it will be difficult ah since u signed e form already . U can try ur luck though but juz don't lose to those idiots

I'm just one guy alone sia and I know pretty much close to nothing on law. Idk how to get them compensate. I think what I can do is suggest that I will bring this incident to case or small claim court..

[Guest]

The thing is, because of the terms and agreements, I'm afraid that I'm under some lawful obligation to pay them the $250. I don't mind giving her that spoil HD and another HD that I have provided to have all data placed into it. They considered the job partially done because part of the D drive data was in it. fxxk sia, partially my arse.

unlikely that they will take legal action against you since the amount is small

I'm just one guy alone sia and I know pretty much close to nothing on law. Idk how to get them compensate. I think what I can do is suggest that I will bring this incident to case or small claim court..

perhaps you should escalate this matter to her superior... hopefully it can be settled amicably

btw, adrc engineer can't be that blur for not recovering the files in c drive (the main drive)

[Kage]

unlikely that they will take legal action against you since the amount is small

perhaps you should escalate this matter to her superior... hopefully it can be settled amicably

btw, adrc engineer can't be that blur for not recovering the files in c drive (the main drive)

I see thanks man!! I think I will just do that. I'll try to ask her to direct me to her manager then I will discuss in detail with her.

[Coolz]

I'm just one guy alone sia and I know pretty much close to nothing on law. Idk how to get them compensate. I think what I can do is suggest that I will bring this incident to case or small claim court..

No need to be scared one it's their fault also wat . But e problem now is u have already signed e contract and agree wit their ridiculous T&Cs and they have e rights .Well unless ur still underaged ah then the e law will have to side wit u. If u really want ur disk back n they die2 wants u to pay for e effort u can try to negotiate wit them more further to bring down e ridiculous amount

[Kage]

Haha is 20 years old still underaged? @@;. Idk, I think I will try to negotiate till I don't have to pay a cent. It's probably be hard though...I haven't gave them a replied yet, waiting for people to actually give me advice on how to go at it lol!

[Coolz]

I dun think so ah old already ley but most contracts in Singapore requires a person to be 21 years old . Haha I support with watever decision tt u gonna make kk! Juz dun let them cheat ur money . Update me later when everything is okay already kk! Ganbatte bro (:

[ubertired]

In the first place, do you even read what you write?

"What I've written in it, quoted "My documents, picture, music, video folder, webcam and phone/camera taken photos folder. Portfolio folder and all media files from D drive." Which obviously states something different."

I don't even understand what you are trying to communicate in the above sentence.

And if you did indicate file recovery for both C and D drives, then they are in the right, because they did fulfil part of the requirements.

You are simply refusing to pay because you didn't get what you want.

[Kage]

In the first place, do you even read what you write?

"What I've written in it, quoted "My documents, picture, music, video folder, webcam and phone/camera taken photos folder. Portfolio folder and all media files from D drive." Which obviously states something different."

I don't even understand what you are trying to communicate in the above sentence.

And if you did indicate file recovery for both C and D drives, then they are in the right, because they did fulfil part of the requirements.

You are simply refusing to pay because you didn't get what you want.

As a layman, I have no idea what sort of 'proper terms' they want, in fact I barely even know what is a C: drive and D: drive, I've only remembered that I have transferred a few files into my D: drive. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't C: drive the drive that everyone use commonly? I thought it was understood that I've wanted the specific folders that I have named, if they can't find it in my D: drive, where else? And isn't it their job to extract all folders/files regardless or whether it is under the request or not?

And I can't see why you can't understand what I've written. It's simple English isn't it? The name of the folders that I've wanted with a full stop followed by another folder and all the media files from D: drive. I don't think I've written anything wrongly? They said to be as specific as possible, hence I gave the names of all the folders I've wanted to prioritize.

And yes, they did retrieve part of the folders that I wanted but the issue here isn't about them being able to retrieve part of it or not, it was because of their misunderstanding of what I have written that they attempted a second recovery which caused the data from my C: drive to 'deteriorate'. Now, I don't think that's my fault, is it?

[Kage]

I dun think so ah old already ley but most contracts in Singapore requires a person to be 21 years old . Haha I support with watever decision tt u gonna make kk! Juz dun let them cheat ur money . Update me later when everything is okay already kk! Ganbatte bro (:

Haha, thanks man. I'll try to negotiate with their manager or something, idk. I think something's amiss with what they say. They say that they can't find the C: drive initially during the retrieval but during the second recovery they could?? Idk, I think I need some advice from someone who specializes in this field.

[passby]

If u know how data recovery is done, u be screwing yourself for spending such money ! Lolx.... :-)

[ubertired]

As a layman, I have no idea what sort of 'proper terms' they want, in fact I barely even know what is a C: drive and D: drive, I've only remembered that I have transferred a few files into my D: drive. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't C: drive the drive that everyone use commonly? I thought it was understood that I've wanted the specific folders that I have named, if they can't find it in my D: drive, where else? And isn't it their job to extract all folders/files regardless or whether it is under the request or not?

And I can't see why you can't understand what I've written. It's simple English isn't it? The name of the folders that I've wanted with a full stop followed by another folder and all the media files from D: drive. I don't think I've written anything wrongly? They said to be as specific as possible, hence I gave the names of all the folders I've wanted to prioritize.

And yes, they did retrieve part of the folders that I wanted but the issue here isn't about them being able to retrieve part of it or not, it was because of their misunderstanding of what I have written that they attempted a second recovery which caused the data from my C: drive to 'deteriorate'. Now, I don't think that's my fault, is it?

1. Apparently, you have no idea how grammatically incorrect your sentences are.

2. How can you put it in writing, then subsequently dispute it? The onus is on you, not the company. They have no idea whether what you wrote is correct without first knowing the contents.

3. Let's say you have a 1 terabyte drive. Do you know how much data is that? If I'm offering a commercial service, I would tie the cost to the amount of data / amount of time spent on recovery.

4. Now you're singing a different tune. First you said you're unhappy with paying the $250 (for recovery of data from D), now you're bringing up the issue of your C drive. Paying the $250 and claiming restitution for damage to your C drive are two separate issues.

This is what you clearly said, and I quote "Idk sia, I was really raging, I swear. I can let go, but I'm definitely not paying them the $250." You are the one who is plainly inconsistent and trying to worm his way of the situation with a variety of excuses. If legal action is ever taken against you, you DESERVE IT.

[GymStock]

I would tend to agree with ubertired.

To TS, I do think you are partially at fault on this;

A. You made a wrong assumption that they should know it include Drive C. However, mind I share with you this is wrong thinking, cos my friends and I keep our data files in Drive D and not C. C is purely for software downloads.

B. it is stated very clearly that they need you to be really specific on the data you are trying to recover. What you have given them is consider as general and not specific at all, much worst it was misleading. When I 1st read your sentence, I do think all those folders are in Drive D.

C. Whether or not it is done to your satisfaction, a service is done. And it is stated clearly that they should be paid. You have read and signed the T&C. Then be a man of integrity and be professional, do pay them. Do not nitpick and give excuses in order not to pay them.

However, saying that, the company has some responsibility too;

1. As a seasoned company in retrieving data, they should know that different people stored their files differently. They should clarify if it is all in Drive D and not C.

2. They should not be giving excuses or try to hide away by giving excuses which at this moments it is coming back to haunt them.

3. Instead of fighting with customers over such issues, if I am the company, I would suggest to the client, pay us $250 and he can still keep whatever was restored to him in Drive D. Instead of wasting time and energy fighting a battle with a customer who is very obvious not going to pay them a single cent.

This is sharing from my own experience in running my own biz.