Microsoft does not back up your data
That surprises most owners. Microsoft keeps the service running and replicates your data across their infrastructure, so a hardware failure on their end does not take you offline. That is not the same as keeping a copy of the file somebody deleted six weeks ago.
Their own service agreement says it plainly, and they recommend third-party backup. Most small businesses have never read that part.
What actually goes wrong
It is almost never a fire or a flood. It is one of these four.
Somebody deletes the wrong thing. A folder, a mailbox, an entire SharePoint site. Microsoft’s retention gives you a limited window, and the clock starts the moment it happens.
Ransomware encrypts everything it can reach. That includes mapped drives, synced OneDrive folders, and any backup sitting on the same network as the machine it started on.
Someone leaves. Their mailbox and files go with the license unless somebody planned for it. This is the most common data loss we see, and it never feels urgent until the day you need the file.
A laptop gets stolen, or just dies. Whatever lived only on that machine is gone. Endpoint backup is the difference between a bad afternoon and a lost quarter.
What we do about it: backup for Exchange, OneDrive, SharePoint and Teams, plus every endpoint. Restores get tested, because a backup nobody has ever restored from is a guess. And if the worst does happen, we run the recovery, at whatever hour it lands.
Start with a free assessment
We will review your setup, your Microsoft 365 tenant, your backups, and your security gaps, then show you exactly what we found. The write-up is yours to keep, whatever you decide to do next.