data archiving solutions

Data archiving solutions: The benefits and what to consider

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As your business grows year on year, the amount of data and information you need to hold increases as well. Whether the data is held in a digital or hard copy format there will come a point when some of the data and information becomes redundant and is no longer needed on a daily basis. However, you may still need it in the future, or you have to retain it for legal and compliance reasons. 

You want your essential data, which is used on a daily basis, to be a manageable size and efficiently stored. A good way to achieve this is by moving the data you no longer use regularly to a less expensive but secure location, while at the same time making it easily available if it’s is needed in the future.

Benefits of archiving your data digitally

The benefits of keeping your archived data digitally in a secure location where it is indexed and organised correctly (and where it cannot be affected by fire or water damage) are:

  • Improve the performance of your current business systems and applications
  • Reduced costs in terms of data back-ups and upgrades
  • Make available valuable floor space within your office and on your servers 
  • Digital data retrieval is quicker, cheaper and greener as there’s no access to your company information
  • Legal and regulatory compliance
  • No loss of data due to traceable audit trails
  • Data is readily available and easy to retrieve
  • Only authorised people can access the data

There are a number of options when it comes to the storage of digital data, including hard drives, USB memory sticks, DLT tapes, DAT tapes, CD Rom and DVD. Look for storage companies that keep hardware under controlled environmental conditions in a durasteel vault.

What to consider

There are many data archiving solutions available for both digital and physical storage and you may need a combination of both in a tailored solution. You need a provider who has state-of-the-art records management centres that have 24/7 CCTV monitoring, sound business practices and transparent pricing.

Whichever way your data is stored, you want to find a storage company that can retrieve your data – whether it’s just a single file or an entire archive box – quickly and accurately. If you need to retrieve a paper file, you will want a company that can deliver it to you safely and on time. 

A good archiving solutions provider will have a complete file tracking solution which locates documents quickly and can also track the file documents from retrieval through to delivery.

With documents that must be kept for legal and compliance reasons, safety is the prime concern, but also look for companies with deep storage solutions as that will make storage more cost-effective.

Archive storage companies will be happy to advise you on best practices, record management policies and retention policies.

Click here to find out more about how we can help you with archiving and the different solutions available.