Files have to come off a file server, a NAS, Google Drive or Dropbox, because the hardware is going, the contract is ending, or the team cannot work from it any more.
Move your files without breaking who can open them.
File and Document Migration
The agreed files move on schedule. The right people can still open what they need, and every folder is checked against the share you started from.
No access to your tenant (your Microsoft 365 environment), no credentials, and no sensitive files are requested through this website.
What is going wrong
The size of the share is known. Its contents are not. Nobody can say how much of it anyone has opened in the last two years, which folders carry permissions set up by someone who left, or which file names and paths will not survive the move as they are. Nobody has decided what happens to the material no one owns any more. And no one has written down what would stop the move, or who makes that call.
Signs you can check yourself
- The file server or NAS is out of warranty, or the storage contract is ending
- People keep local copies because the shared drive is slow or hard to reach
- Folder permissions were set up by someone who has left
- Nobody can say how much of the share anyone has opened in the last two years
What waiting affects
- Permissions that do not come across land in one of two places, and both are expensive: people who cannot open the files they need on Monday, or files opened by people who were not meant to have them.
- A file that was not counted before the old server is switched off can only be got back by paying to keep that server running past the date it was meant to go.
- File names and paths that the old system allowed and the new one does not fail quietly during the move, so the gap is found by whoever needed the file, not by whoever ran the move.
- Moving everything because nobody decided what to leave behind means paying to store years of material no one will open again, every month, from now on.
What AZ changes
Not findings. These are the things that are different afterwards.
- 1What is in scope is counted before anything moves, and each folder gets a named destination.
- 2Permissions are mapped as they are today, and the target list of who can open what is agreed in writing before the move.
- 3File names and paths the destination will not accept are found first and fixed, rather than discovered as failures mid-move.
- 4The move runs in dated groups, and each group is checked before the next one starts.
- 5The destination is checked against the source file by file, and every gap is closed or given an owner.
How you know the job is finished
The engagement ends when all of these are true and demonstrable.
- Every folder on the agreed list has arrived at its named destination
- Access is tested against the agreed list of who should be able to open what
- Every folder is counted back against the original share, and the files that had to be renamed to survive the move are listed for you
What moves the price
The figure comes from what is actually in the environment. Headcount is one input among several, and rarely the one that matters most.
- How much data is moving, and how many shares or sites it comes from
- Whether permissions carry across or have to be rebuilt at the destination
- How much has to be sorted, archived or left behind before the move
- Whether people keep working in the files while the move runs
You may not need this engagement
- The files are already in SharePoint or OneDrive and the real problem is how they are organized
- It is one folder that one person can copy across in an afternoon
- The move is between two Microsoft 365 tenants, which is its own job
Can we not just drag the folders into OneDrive?
For a small share, yes. It goes wrong at scale in ways that are quiet: permissions do not come with the files, so people either lose access on Monday or gain access they should not have, and file names and paths the old system allowed will fail on the way in without announcing it. Those failures get found by whoever needed the file, not by whoever ran the copy.
The full scope
Everything this engagement commits to, in detail. None of it is a surprise on the last day.
What is not included
Stated so the scope means the same thing to both sides on the last day as it did on the first.
- Licenses needed to run the move
- Sorting or renaming content before the move, unless it is agreed as part of the scope
- Repairing a source system that is already failing
- Help desk and staff support
What you provide
Named up front, because these are the things that stall an engagement when nobody owns them.
- Decide what moves, what gets archived, and what is left behind
- Confirm who should be able to open what at the destination
- Give administrator access to the source and the destination
- Tell your staff when the files move and support them afterwards
How changes are made, and how they are undone
Work on live systems carries risk. This is the method, not a reassurance.
- Folders move in dated groups, and a group is not started until the one before it checks out.
- The conditions that stop the move are agreed before the first file moves, and they name conditions rather than intentions.
- The source stays readable until the check sheet is signed off, so a gap found late still has somewhere to be recovered from.
What you get at the end
Yours to keep whatever happens next, including handing it to your own team or another provider.
- The counted list of everything that moved
- The permissions map, before and after
- The list of names and paths that had to be changed to survive the move
- The agreed conditions for stopping
- The check sheet proving source and destination match
Plan the File Move
Describe what is happening, what has to be working differently, and any deadline behind it. A reply comes within one business day with the most direct next step, or a clear answer that AZ Innovations is not the right fit.
Plan the File Move →