I work for a national company in QA, but also moonlighting for a small company in my state. My computer crashed almost 2 weeks ago. Bought new one. Paid to have the geeksquad at Best Buy transfer at least the "My Documents" section to an external hard drive. I did have patient lists and clinic notes, some, which I had transferred to the small company's server, but she asked me to keep in case I had to resubmit for some reason, for about 2 months. well the geeks somehow lost my hard drive and when I opened up the one they gave me, the new external hard drive, it was somebody else's stuff! They have no idea where MY hard drive is. the small company's owner said it is not my fault,but she's afraid if her docs found out, she could lose them.

I am just in a dither, trying not to be, but . . . Do any of you think I'd have a case for a lawsuit against Best Buy IF they never find my hard drive? What arethe HIPAA rules in this case? Keep my mouth shut? I had to tell my small company gal. She did not fire me nor blame me even. What are you guys' advice? thanks.

OMG!!!!
Do you have insurance to cover yourself? If so, make a claim. Talk to your insurance and see what can be done. Also, I would talk to someone at HIPPA. Ask general questions about something like this and see what they have to say.

I hope they find your hard drive....maybe the person's hard drive you have has yours. Make Best Buy find out. Go to the manager of the store, pitch a fit....kick some butt....lol..I know you have to be mad and very upset.

I'm so sorry.

Believe me we put the fear of God in them. Husband was livid. I should have said that the supervisor of the geeksquad has taken this to corporate headquarters of Best Buy and I think heads are going to roll. Husband and I both told them what happens to people who commit HIPAA violations! I swear though, if they can't find it, I AM to contact a lawyer and see about suing them. Yes, we DID go to manager AND pitched a fit, my husband did, bless him, I had to work. LOL - thanks!

Keep us up-to-date on this and let us know what happens. I hope they have to be made to do something.

well they miraculously found the wayward hard drive. They are idiots. They said it could not accessed, and that I could have it sent to Kentucky some place and it is usually $1600 when this happens, but they would do it for free. We said no, you people had your chance, you blew it. end of story. Now I have do all my CMT recertification over, but oh well. That's life. Live and learn. Now I have online backup if this happens again.

I am glad they found it. Sorry for the loss of your things. My computer went down about a month ago and lost everything too. Before I start to do anything with work I will have a backup of everything. I know how you feel about having to do things over.

Judy, I hope you are online tonight. I found you on this forum wish I would have found it about 2 courses ago. I am currently on Mail Quiz 36 and could use some help. And help using this site.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Tina

Tina,

I will be glad to help you. I sent you a PM. If you need me just ask. I'm here on and off during the day and night

Good afternoon Judy. I am now working my way through Quiz 36 Marianne Morales Operative report. I am almost done.
Tina

Hi --

EGS, I`m so glad they found your drive.
For all of you, you really should think about backing up your drives to prevent this ever happening to you -- with good backup, you can just ask your computer supplier to do a low-level format on the old drive, which will remove ALL the data so you don`t have to worry about confidentiality.

There are now many affordable and easy-to-use devices for backup (I remember when they were either horribly expensive or horribly clumsy -- trying to stay backed up when I had to use floppies was a nightmare). Here`s the first page of a Google search for hard drive backup --
http://tinyurl.com/796v2tk

You can read about what`s available and how it`s used. You can back up documents, images, programs, and even the operating system if you like. You can schedule times for backups to be done (you do have to remember to leave the computer on at those times). I have a separate drive that`s plugged into a USB port and backs up everything, including the operating system, continuously. It cost less than $100 Cdn., and I don`t have to remember when or how to do it.

When your computer is how you make your living, you have to realize that a drive or a chip can fail at any time, so it`s extremely important to keep everything backed up so that you`ll be ready to get back to work as quickly as possible.

Hope this helps someone!
happy saturday
carol

Yes, you're right. Norton Security has online backup, and we get that free from Comcast, so I have that now set up to routinely backup. I DO have a new external hard drive, but those can crash or be stolen too. so all is backed up with Norton Online. I'm getting ready to go to college online, so this new computer is going to get a workout!!