Data portability at the end of a software contract

Portability and lock-in: two sides of the same problem

Data portability is the freedom to change provider while taking your body of information with you. Its opposite is lock-in, the situation where the data is technically held hostage in a format only the current provider can read, or made available so incompletely that switching to another system becomes impractical.

For a management firm, lock-in is a real risk: the historical accounting of dozens of condominiums, the owners' register and the document archives built over years of work are hard to reconstruct from scratch. Evaluating portability is not a technical detail but a strategic choice that must be made before tying yourself to a piece of software.

What to ask before signing

The right time to think about the exit is the entry. Before adopting a management system it is worth asking explicitly how the data is exported, in which formats and with what completeness. A transparent provider states without difficulty that the data can be downloaded in open, widely used formats, readable by other systems.

You should also clarify what happens at the end of the relationship: how long the data stays accessible after cancellation, whether the export is included or has a cost, and whether the provider commits to deleting the data after the migration. Putting these points in writing avoids nasty surprises at the moment of separation.

• Export formats that are open and readable by other systems
• Completeness: accounting, owners' register, documents, minutes and attachments
• Data access timeframe after the contract ends
• Any export costs and the commitment to final deletion

The right to portability under the GDPR

Portability is not just a good commercial practice but also a right. Article 20 of Regulation EU 2016/679 grants the data subject the right to receive their personal data in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format, and to transmit it to another controller. For the owners' personal data this principle strengthens the firm's position in demanding a complete export in a standard format.

Bear in mind that GDPR portability concerns personal data, while the condominium's accounting and technical archives fall within a broader framework of contractual freedom. In practice the two aspects add up in the firm's favour, which has both a practical interest and a legal basis for demanding its own data.

What to export at the moment of departure

At the end of the contract the export must be complete: accounting for all financial years, the owners' register with contacts, the thousandths (millesimi) tables, minutes, contracts, documents and attachments. A partial export, downloading only the last year or only some categories, leaves gaps that will surface months later, when a historical document is needed.

The downloaded copy must be verified the way you verify a backup: checking that the files open, that the totals match and that the attached documents are actually present. Only after confirming integrity is it wise to definitively close the relationship with the old provider and request the deletion of the leftover data.

AmministraPro and the freedom of your data

AmministraPro lets you import data from other management systems and manage the archive in a structured way, so moving from one system to another does not start from scratch. Transparency about the data is part of the approach: your firm's data stays yours and usable.

You can see the import and archiving tools on the /funzioni page and evaluate the plans on the /prezzi page, checking the solution best suited to a firm that wants to stay free to choose.

Frequently asked questions