The lab · pricing
Exeter data recovery prices. Every price published, and fixed in writing before we start.
Recovery for Exeter starts at £250 + VAT, and the full set of bands sits in the table below where anyone can read it — not held back for the phone. Finding out where your own device lands costs nothing, and on most jobs you only ever pay if your files actually come back.
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Every kind of Exeter job, priced.
| Starts at | Job type | What that covers |
|---|---|---|
| £250 + VAT | Memory cards & USB sticks | SD, microSD and CF cards, and USB flash drives |
| £300 + VAT | Single drives of every kind | HDD, SSD and NVMe — internal, external, laptop or desktop |
| £300 + VAT | Macs & MacBooks | APFS and HFS+, FileVault, T2 and Apple Silicon |
| £400 + VAT | CCTV / DVR / NVR | Hikvision, Dahua, Swann and other embedded recorders |
| from £500 + VAT | RAID, NAS & servers | RAID 0/1/5/6/10; Synology, QNAP, WD, HP, Dell and Lenovo |
| from £500 + VAT | Databases | SQL Server, MySQL, PostgreSQL and Exchange |
| begins at £800 + VAT | Virtual machines | VMDK, VHDX, VHD and QCOW2 — snapshots and damaged VM folders |
| begins at £800 + VAT | Forensics & investigation | Workplace cases and court-ready reporting, custody chain preserved |
| from £1,250 + VAT | SAN & enterprise storage | Datastores spanning more than one array |
Not sure where your device fits? The free diagnostic will place it: the band, the probable fault, and what to do next.
How to read those numbers.
- VAT is added to every figure shown, at the standard UK rate.
- Treat them as starting points, not totals. The fault decides your actual price, which goes on paper after the free diagnosis and before a penny of chargeable work.
- No fix, no fee covers most jobs. If we can't return the files you asked for, the recovery itself costs you nothing.
- Three kinds of work carry a 50% deposit: donor-part repairs inside the drive, CCTV/DVR recorders, and forensic instructions. All three eat specialist bench hours win or lose. The other half is owed only once your data is home.
What moves a quote within its band.
How things go once you're quoted.
| What happens | What it usually means | What it costs you |
|---|---|---|
| You accept | We start work at that fixed figure | Payable once the file list is verified |
| You decline | We return the device along with what we found | Diagnosis free, and the post home is on us |
| The files can't be saved | No fix, no fee applies to most work | You owe nothing for the try |
| Something unexpected appears part-way | We stop and ring you before going on | The quoted price does not move |
| Forensic, recorder or mechanical work | 50% up front, the balance on success | Explained before you agree to anything |
| A drive opened before it reached us | Quoted individually after inspection | No-fix-no-fee can't always apply |
Why the cheapest advert rarely stays cheap
- That £49 banner is bait, not a price — its job is to land your drive on their bench; the real figure appears after the lid is off and walking away feels impossible.
- Ask what happens when the recovery fails — without no fix, no fee, a lab has little reason to tell you promptly that the disk is beyond saving.
- Ask if the price can move once agreed — ours can't. Whatever complications appear after sign-off are our problem to absorb; your bill stays where it was.
- Ask whose bench the drive actually sits on — plenty of firms are brokers who add a margin and ship it on. Ours never leaves our own lab.
An honest word about price lists: our starting figures mean what they say — a logical fault on a single hard disk is £300 + VAT, not '£300-ish'. What no list can predict is whether the job needs one donor part or three. That is what diagnosis is for, and it is why your final number is written down before any drive is opened.
Straight answers to the questions we hear most.
How much does data recovery cost?
£250 + VAT opens the scale, covering memory cards and USB sticks. A single drive of whatever kind — hard disk, SSD, laptop or Mac — runs to £300 + VAT. Recorders come in at £400 + VAT. Once several drives are involved — RAID, NAS, server — the start is £500 + VAT; for virtual machines or forensic instructions it is from £800 + VAT. The table above sets them all out; your own price is fixed in writing once the free diagnosis has been carried out.
Is the diagnosis really free?
Yes, and it stays true even if you decline the quote we send. Your only cost is posting the device to us — we cover the trip home.
What makes some jobs need a deposit?
Whether they succeed or not, three kinds of job cost us the same amount: forensic instructions, recorder work, and drive-level repairs that need matched donor parts. Those three take a 50% deposit up front, the rest payable once your data is actually back. Every other job is strictly no fix, no fee.
So when is payment actually due?
Payment falls due once you've approved the recovered file listing, before the data is released — as the terms say. Nothing up front on a standard job, nothing midway.
Any surprises in the bill?
None. The diagnosis is free, we pay the return postage, and the price you approve is the price you pay. The only optional extra is priority handling — quoted up front, before you commit.
Do you match cheaper quotes?
Ask the cheaper firm three things: will the price still stand if the drive needs opening, what's the charge when nothing is recovered, and do they run their own lab. From us: the price is fixed, you'd pay nothing, and yes we do.
The starting price is public. Your exact one is free to find out.
Send the form or put the drive in the post: we diagnose it free, write the price down, and leave the decision with you.