José Henrique Lamensdorf wrote:
Unless the client requests otherwise*, I delete them completely one month after the job has been received, accepted, and paid for.
*One client asked me to keep all their files, and some of them are 30 years old! Now and then, when I had time to spare, I updated them to remain compatible with current hard/software.
One big operation, in the pre-Windows era, was done using a Trackstar 128 interface (it emulated an Apple II within a PC-XT), to convert Apple II files into PC files. I had to develop some software to bridge ASCII codes for PT accented characters.
Others included updating files as old as from PageMaker 3 (which ran on the icon-less Windows 2.01) successively all the way to PageMaker 6.5.
I have no objection to keeping client files on CDs/DVDs if they want me to, nor to snail-mailing them such disks, however I only do it on request.
A recent case make me think about it.
One client hired me through a local agency, to do some 2 GB worth of video files work. I did it, delivered via cloud as usual, on the very same service they had used to send me the source material. It stays there for a week.
I chose to keep these files for longer than usual, just in case.
About a month later, the agency called me. The end-client had not downloaded the files, and they were no longer on the cloud. So I uploaded them again.
I got wary, and decided to keep those files for much longer than usual.
Two months later, I got a message that the end-client was not managing to download the files again. (Good news is that this cloud is secure, they really delete the files after a week.)
So I uploaded it again.
Three months later, I called the PM at the agency, asked her about deleting those files for good. She told me they were apparently happy, had paid the full amount ages ago, so it should be safe to get rid of them.
Murphy's Law rulez! On the next day after I had deleted these files, the PM called to tell me that the only person who had ever downloaded the files had been fired from the end-client! Apparently the disgruntled dischargee had wiped clean the hard drive on his/her computer, so they'd need those files again.
All right, this end-client is a large player in the IT business. I have some of their products myself. The person they sacked was clearly not a techie, so it should be easy to recover those files from a freshly-formatted hard drive, or perhaps from a server. I could do it, but as they are supposedly experts, I kept my mouth shut.
To no avail. They are now considering have me redo it from scratch. Meanwhile, I'm doing another similar job for them. This time, after the epilogue, I'll save the files to two data DVDs, keep one myself, and give the other to the agency. Safety first!
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