When using an online service for going paperless, the ability to get your stuff out of the system is as important as what you can do in the system.
You don’t want a situation where you upload all your documents somewhere and then if you decide to leave the service, you can’t.
Recently I wrote about how to export your data out of Evernote, and now OfficeDrop, an online scanning and digital filing system, has written a blog post outlining how to get your data out should you choose to.
Whether you are cancelling your account or just need to get your documents out of our cloud and onto your desktop, there are 3 easy ways to move your files from OfficeDrop to your computer. As always, no matter how you download your documents, they will always retain their text-searchable PDF format.
You can read the blog post for more information, but the three options they currently provide are:
- Download the documents
- Request a DVD copy of your account
- Request a link to a zip file of your account contents that you can download (this happens automatically if you cancel).
I really like companies being upfront about how to cancel and get your stuff out rather than hiding it. Nice work OfficeDrop.
Related posts:
Brooks, thanks for the post on OfficeDrop. We believe that our customers own their documents, so we try to make it easy to get information out of our system. While we obviously don't want customers to quit our service, we do understand that companies' and peoples' needs change, and we want our customers to be able to take their documents anywhere they want. Thanks for thinking of us!
Larry King once wisely said, “I remind myself every morning: Nothing I say this day will teach me anything. So if I’m going to learn, I must do it by listening.” That is precisely how I feel. I am thankful to have learned something new today. – Tenis
It is nice that officedrop will tell you how to cancel, but after promising me a link to download they haven't done so. What is annoying is that one cannot simply download all or a subset of one's documents by selecting them. This seems straighforward but for some reason requires an officedrop human to do it, and they haven't done it for me. So, good on rhetoric, bad on execution.