dataretrieval.com will rip you off. DON'T USE their services Chicago, Illinois

After not hearing from my contact at Data Retrieval for weeks, I received an email only a few hours after posting the complaint above on several websites. It was then that he gave me a small refund for my troubles. He stated that they would do a second retrieval at no cost to recover the files that came back corrupted. (I had never received my original drive back in the first place, so they already had it to do the recovery.) 

AGAIN, I went through weeks with dozens of attempts to contact anyone over phone and email with no reply. Finally I got online and used the website's "live chat." After only a few minutes to look up my case, the gentleman told me that my case was closed and nothing else was able to be recovered. I asked him for the phone number of a manager, who I was able to get on the phone and who argued with me for fifteen minutes. I furiously explained my story and he refused to comply with a refund. I finally got him to agree to yet another, small refund. I spoke with a lawyer who told me the fees to sue would likely be just as much as the amount I would get back so I did not pursue legal action. 

Sir, you mentioned the quote and initial diagnosis process of a recovery. I did pay for the initial $300 diagnostic review and was instructed to "...log in to your account on-line to verify the recovered data." Do not be mistaken that I was completely satisfied with the cost for a recovery of all the files listed in the File Directory Viewer. I was told, verbatim: "Not until we have a complete recovery would the final amount be due." The issue here is that more than half of my files came back unreadable; 21,360 items to be exact. I would not have moved forward for a partial recovery and I want a full refund, but the manager with whom I spoke was simply unwilling to comply. 

I encourage you to look up my case: #20606. You will find that everything I have said was documented just as well by your company as it has been by me and that nothing here has been misconceived. Now the question is, are you willing to provide the full refund that is owed to me? 

I am very sorry if you have had a bitter experience. We pleasure in providing quality and expedited data recovery services and solutions that are priced reasonably. True for some cases the services we offer for recovering data seems to be high due to the intensity of the damage involved in the media. Though an estimate can be given during the initial conversation, it is only after a thorough diagnosis done on the drive that exact price for the data recovery can be quoted based on the
reality and severity of the data damage.

I feel it is my responsibility to make things right if your complaint is genuine. I am not certain of what occurred as far as your case is concerned, but I would be more than happy to discuss with you so as to find if my company has overlooked your case, or you have misconceived our service inadvertently. DataRetrieval.com always endeavors to make customers happy and satisfied by providing the best possible data recovery services and solutions at reasonable rates for all types of data loss issues.

Thanks

I get it that sending the drive to another location means that dataretrieval is just a middleman that does not do the work themselves. Also sending the drive to Canada certainly wasn't the cheapest solution considering the high currency exchange rate on the Canadian dollar. In any case, it is likely that sending to Canada yourself would have been cheaper.