We do not have a lab or an office on the Gold Coast. Our nearest office is the Brisbane lab at Level 10, 95 North Quay, Brisbane QLD 4000, about an hour’s drive north for most of the Gold Coast, depending on traffic. Gold Coast customers either drive their device up to Brisbane or send it to us. This page explains both options honestly, including how long each one usually takes.
Payam Data Recovery has been recovering data in Australia since 1998, with over 300,000 successful recoveries. The assessment is free for every device except phones and tablets, which are a fixed price.
Your three ways to get a device to us from the Gold Coast
1. Drive it to our Brisbane lab
For a real emergency, driving to Brisbane is often the fastest option. The Brisbane lab is open Monday to Friday, 9am to 5:30pm. Bring the device in, ask for an urgent assessment and approve Emergency service, and we start as quickly as possible. An urgent assessment costs $150 for a written quote in 1 to 2 hours, or $500 for a quote in 2 to 3 hours on RAID and NAS units. If you cannot make the trip yourself, a family member or friend can bring it in for you.
2. Australia Post Express Post
For most jobs, Express Post is affordable and reliable. It usually arrives the next business day, and sometimes takes two. Submit a job online first. You get a job number and a PDF address label to put on the box, and you pay the postage.
3. A same-day courier, at your cost
If the job cannot wait for the post, you can book a same-day courier yourself. Options include Zoom2U, TNT, StarTrack, DHL and FedEx, or you can compare services on Interparcel. What is available depends on your suburb and the time of day, so please check the options and prices yourself. You book and pay the courier directly.
Where the work is done
About 80% of jobs are worked on at the office that receives them, so most Gold Coast jobs are done in Brisbane: hard drives with bad sectors or a damaged circuit board, SSDs that still read, file system problems, RAID and NAS units, and USB flash drives with a broken connector.
A few specialist faults are always done at our main lab in Rhodes, NSW: hard drives with damaged heads, SSDs with a failed controller or NAND chip, logic board repairs on phones, tablets and MacBooks, and chip-off work. If your device needs one of these, Brisbane sends it to Rhodes by overnight courier at our cost, and you keep dealing with the same job number. If you already know your drive is clicking or your SSD is not detected and the job is urgent, call us on 1300 444 800 first and we will tell you where it is best to send it.
Free assessment and three service speeds
Every device except phones and tablets gets a free assessment and a written quote. The quote tells you what is wrong, how long it takes, the chance of success, and the price for each of our three service levels:
- Economy is our standard service and the best value. We work on it when we are not working on Priority and Emergency jobs, so it takes longer.
- Priority puts your job ahead of Economy jobs.
- Emergency is the fastest we can possibly work, including after hours.
The success rate is the same for all three. Only the speed changes. Nothing chargeable starts until you approve the quote.
Most hard drive, SSD, USB and memory card recoveries cost $375 to $1,750 on Economy, and most RAID and NAS recoveries cost $2,500 to $6,500. Phones and tablets are a fixed price: $795 Economy, $1,500 Priority or $2,500 Emergency. Most recoveries are no fix, no fee. Some complex cases have an attempt fee, then a completion fee only if the recovery is successful. The full list of prices and turnaround times by fault is on our data recovery cost page.
Weekends, nights and public holidays
Outside business hours, Monday to Friday 9am to 5:30pm, only Emergency service is available, and it usually starts from about $2,000. A non-refundable emergency assessment fee of $150, or $500 for RAID and NAS, applies, and our staff may need 1 to 2 hours’ notice to reach the office. For a genuine emergency after hours, call 0404 872 926. Read more about emergency data recovery.
Real jobs from the Gold Coast and Queensland
- Gold Coast architect, formatted SSD. Marcus formatted the wrong Crucial SSD and lost years of project drawings. He stopped using it straight away, which gave the drive no time to finish erasing itself, and we recovered more than 90% of his files. Read the Gold Coast SSD case study.
- Toowoomba iMac Fusion Drive. Christine sent in the SSD and hard drive from an iMac that would no longer boot, holding years of art and design work. Read the iMac Fusion Drive case study.
- Queensland family video. Boren’s WD external drive slowed down, then stopped showing up. The family video came back and the new drive went home to Queensland by Express Post. Read the WD external drive case study.
- Brisbane small business records. James’s Seagate 4TB portable drive, less than a year old, stopped being detected while it held his invoices and business records. Read the Seagate portable drive case study.
Before you send anything
Stop using the device. Do not run recovery software on a drive that is clicking, slow or not detected, and do not format anything your computer asks you to format. Check whether you already have a copy in OneDrive, Google Drive, iCloud or another backup, because you may not need us at all. If the data matters and there is no backup, send only the device itself, without chargers, cables or cases, packed in a small firm box with bubble wrap.
Gold Coast data recovery questions
Do you have an office on the Gold Coast?
No. Our nearest office is the Brisbane lab at Level 10, 95 North Quay, Brisbane, about an hour’s drive from most of the Gold Coast. You can drive your device there or send it by Express Post or a courier.
Is it faster to drive to Brisbane or to post it?
For a real emergency, driving to Brisbane is usually fastest, because we start as quickly as possible once you approve Emergency service after an urgent assessment. Express Post usually arrives the next business day, sometimes two.
Can I bring my device to Brisbane on a weekend?
Only for Emergency service. Outside business hours a non-refundable emergency assessment fee of $150, or $500 for RAID and NAS, applies, Emergency usually starts from about $2,000, and our staff may need 1 to 2 hours’ notice. Call 0404 872 926 for genuine emergencies only.
Will my device stay in Queensland?
Usually yes, because most jobs are done at the Brisbane lab. Damaged heads, failed SSD controllers or NAND chips, logic board repairs and chip-off work are done at our Rhodes lab in NSW, and we send the device there by overnight courier at our cost.
Can a Gold Coast business send a NAS or server?
Yes. Send all of the drives from the array, labelled with their slot numbers. Most RAID and NAS recoveries cost $2,500 to $6,500 on Economy, and an urgent RAID or NAS assessment costs $500 for a quote in 2 to 3 hours. Read about RAID and NAS data recovery.
Next step
Submit a job online, ask for a free quote or call 1300 444 800. For genuine emergencies after hours only, call 0404 872 926. Our Brisbane address, opening hours, directions and parking are on the Brisbane lab page.
International customers are always welcome. The easiest way to reach us from overseas is by email at help@payam.com.au, which works in every time zone.
