from what I understand, you will lose access to all the data. I've not seen the T&Cs for this particular software, but it's a general feature of the cloudy stuff. All the advice is to grab what you can before you stop paying.
Post a link to the T&Cs here if you like and I will have a quick gander.
is it just your data, or clients? What are you thinking of moving to?
-- Edited by Cheshire on Wednesday 19th of October 2016 09:58:45 AM
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Joanne
Winner of Bookkeeper of the Year 2015, 2016 & 2017
Thoughts are my own/not to be regarded as official advice,which should be sought from a suitably qualified Accountant.
You should check out answers with reference to the legal position
Sorry not wishing to mislead you, I don't currently use any cloud solution as this is an issue that concerns me.
I'm not keen on the idea of me or a client being tied to any of them, and wondered where this sits with compliance should I lose data and/or documents if the subscription is not paid up. I have spoken to someone today who told me I can 'request' the information, but I'm still not entirely comfortable with this.
This is exactly one of the issues I have with storing data - which has to be kept for a mandatory period - in a subscription-based system. It is a perfectly reasonable thing to be concerned about. This is what Xero's public-facing Terms of Use say:
5. Intellectual Property
2. Ownership of Data:
Title to, and all Intellectual Property Rights in, the Data remain Your property. However, Your access to the Data is contingent on full payment of the Xero Access Fee when due. You grant Xero a licence to use, copy, transmit, store, and back-up Your information and Data for the purposes of enabling You to access and use the Services and for any other purpose related to provision of services to You.
In other words, it's your data - but you can only access it if you pay your ongoing access fee. As far as I can tell - but do bear in mind I only skim read it for key points like the above, so I could easily have missed it - there is no mention of whether they retain the data, for how long, and whether they'll subsequently provide access to it if needed. At the very least, I'd guess that it'll remain on their system for a while if the subscription isn't formally terminated, but fees aren't paid - but that's just a guess, and who knows what a 'while' actually is.
However, it's the next one I quote that, I think, is important (and needs to be considered alongside the one above):
6. Warranties and Acknowledgements
You acknowledge that:
7. You remain solely responsible for complying with all applicable accounting, tax and other laws. It is Your responsibility to check that storage of and access to your Data via the Software and the Website will comply with laws applicable to you (including any laws requiring you to retain records).
My interpretation of those two points is that if you need to be able to continue accessing the data, you need to keep paying - so if you end a subscription and still need to access it, tough luck.
If it's the case that you can 'request' information and they'll provide it - I would imagine for an additional admin charge - they should perhaps state that somewhere on the site, be that in the Ts&Cs (where I didn't see it, but bear in mind that I skim read it) or in a separate FAQ list.
-- Edited by VinceH on Wednesday 19th of October 2016 09:36:16 PM
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Vince M Hudd - Soft Rock Software
(I only came here looking for fellow apiarists...)
I found this on their Q&A page. The 'in the future' / 'likely' comment I find rather odd. Would've thought they would have got this sorted already!! But confirms otherwise that you have to export the data.
How long does my data stay in Xero? If you want to stop using Xero, you can do so at any time there is no obligatory or contractual period. You will be billed up until the day you remove your organisation. In the future we expect to provide customers with a storage or archival service at a greatly reduced monthly fee. This will likely provide you read-only access to the existing organisation, meaning that you may not have to get your data out of Xero. If you'd like to contact us and discuss this service, click Contact Xero Support at the end of this Help page. In the meantime there are a series of reports and other data you can export in order to obtain your own copy.
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Joanne
Winner of Bookkeeper of the Year 2015, 2016 & 2017
Thoughts are my own/not to be regarded as official advice,which should be sought from a suitably qualified Accountant.
You should check out answers with reference to the legal position
Yes - in my opinion, the whole data retention requirement is one that should have been considered, thought out and resolved right at the start for any region being targeted. However, it's no surprise that it hasn't and organisations like Xero1 mark it as something that's 'coming soon'. It's the same problem as security, privacy, and ongoing support in idIOT/iOUT2 devices - companies have rushed things to market without thinking of everything they need to and should have already thought about and, where appropriate, addressed.
Appropriately named, since I have 'xero' faith in anything cloud-based.
'Internet of Things' devices. idIOT speaks for itself as to why I use it. iOUT is my slightly expanded acronym - the 'u' stands for 'unwanted', and I capitalise it as iOUT so the 'out' is emphasised and echoes what the 'u' stands for.
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Vince M Hudd - Soft Rock Software
(I only came here looking for fellow apiarists...)
