Fields Data Recovery

Fields Data Recovery: data recovery for organisations since 1999

Fields Data Recovery is a UK-based data recovery provider that has been helping organisations recover lost data from RAID arrays and hard drives since 1999. Its client base spans small businesses, charities, government departments and large corporations. The company states that thousands of companies have used its services to recover from data loss emergencies.

The service is built around a free, no-obligation 24-hour diagnostic. After receiving the media, the company produces a report, a list of recoverable files and a fixed-fee quote. If the customer decides not to proceed, the media is returned and no charge is made. Fields Data Recovery reports a recovery rate of 92.5% across all media and failure types, and states that it has completed over 140,000 diagnostics on hundreds of media and system types.

Media and systems covered

The recovery catalogue covers a broad range of storage technologies and failure scenarios, including:

• Hard drives, including failed drives and external drives
• RAID arrays, with specific mention of RAID1 and RAID5
• Servers and virtualisation environments, including VM Ware
• SSDs
• NAS and SAN systems
• Databases, including SQL Server and Oracle
• Self-encrypting drives and Seagate SSHD
• File systems such as EXT2, EXT3 and HFS
• Brand-specific drives including Buffalo, Drobo, Hitachi, LaCie, Seagate, Toshiba and Western Digital

How the recovery process works

The process is organised in three stages. First, the customer packages the media, completes a shipping form and sends it by Royal Mail Special Delivery or courier. On receipt, Fields Data Recovery issues a unique ID by email, determines the fault and sends a list of recoverable files together with a no-obligation fixed-price quotation. If recovery proves impossible, the drive is returned by a secure method under the company's Return Drive Policy.

Once the work is complete, the recovered data is transferred to new media and returned by secure next-day delivery after payment. The company retains a copy of the data for seven days in case of query, after which it is securely erased.

Facilities, accreditation and team

Fields Data Recovery describes its laboratories as state-of-the-art and equipped from soldering irons upwards. The company states that it holds ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 accreditation, presented as a triple accreditation for a professional and complete service. It also maintains a library of spare parts, which it says saves customers time and money. According to the company, each of its technicians has handled more than 1,000 hard drives.

Pricing and diagnostic tools

The website includes a price calculator that, given the media type and drive size, shows how much three similar recoveries have cost. Drive sizes range from under 40GB to over 4TB, and media types include hard drives, laptop and PC drives, servers, external disks, RAID arrays, media and SSDs. The company also publishes a price guide and offers a free diagnostic as the entry point to a quote.

UK offices and international network

The headquarters is in Pencoed, Bridgend (CF35 5LJ), listed as the Cardiff headquarters. The company also lists offices in Birmingham and London, all offering drop-off, advanced recovery and customer relations. Internationally, Fields Data Recovery states that it has 18 offices worldwide, with locations in Germany (Berlin, Hamburg, Cologne), France (Paris, Lyon), Italy (Milan, Turin), Spain (Barcelona, Madrid), the United States (California, Florida, Missouri, New York and Texas), Canada (Hamilton, Montreal, Vancouver), Ireland (Dublin) and Mexico (Mexico City).

Contact and availability

The company operates a Freephone helpline, 0800 083 7891, which it states is available . The website also references Trustpilot reviews, although the score itself is not displayed without analytics cookies enabled.