Dropbox storage decrease from 5 to 2g and files gone!

[Tim1985]

I used to have some extra storage capacity (from Samsung tablet many years ago).  I checked today the size become 2g and all my photos were gone!

Can someone tell me what happens to my account?  How can I bring these photos back?

[Rich]

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@Tim1985 wrote:

I used to have some extra storage capacity (from Samsung tablet many years ago).  I checked today the size become 2g and all my photos were gone! Can someone tell me what happens to my account?  How can I bring these photos back?

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Bonus space earned through a device promotion is not permanent. It has an expiration on it, varying from 6 months to 2 years, depending on the device and the promotion at the time. Once that time has lapsed, the bonus space is removed from the account. This does not delete any files. It simply lowers your storage quota by the amount earned in the promotion.

Dropbox does not delete files from your account, even if your storage quota is decreased. At most, if your quota is decreased so much as to put you over your new limit, you just wouldn't be able to sync any new content to your account. Your account would remain active will all your files, and you'd still be able to access them.

If you have files missing then there are a couple of possibilities. You've signed in to the wrong account, or you left your account idle for more than a year, in which case the entire account would have been deleted, and you're now signed in to a new, empty account.

[Tim1985]

@Rich,

Thank you for quick response.  I still have got questions as follows after reading your reply:

1. When I checked my storage quota a few months ago, it just showed more than 5g, no expiry date which made me believe this was a permanent space.

2. My promotion reward was more than 10 years ago, when Samsung first launched its tablet.  After more than 10 years, Dropbox did not remove it, but remove it quickly after I used the storage quota without any warning.  This is not very nice one!

3. As you said, the files were not deleted, only not able to sync them.  However, when I logged in and looked at my account in the web, I could only see an empty storage with one or two files there.

4. How can I bring the files back onto my account?  Can Dropbox gave my files back for a day and let me to process them and then remove the storage quota?

5. Anyway to complain this to Dropbox by email or website.  Currently I am in a dilemma when trying to access them

Could you please help me to get my files back?

[Hannah]

Hey @Tim1985, thanks for reaching out to our Community.

Like Rich explained, this sounds like you probably signed in to a different account and not your original one.

Can you go to the plan tab in your account settings, to double-check how much space you have? 

And this page will show you your files. 

Let me know what you find.

[Tim1985]

Hi Hannah,

Thank you!  I have checked plan tab.  It shows: Current Plan: 2G.  Using 2.32 MB of 6.88 GB.  That means that I still have 6.88 GB.  But where is my photos?  All I can say is that I reinstall Windows 10 on my PC a few times, will that matter?  How I can get back my photos?  Please help.

[Jay]

Hi @Tim1985, since you only have 2.32 MB of files on your account, it means it's more or less empty, so reinstalling Windows would make no difference.

Could you check your events page to see if the files were deleted at some point, and also check the deleted files page?

[Tim1985]

Hi Jay,

Thank you for reply.  Deleted files folder is empty and I could not see meaningful info from events folder either.  Are there any way Dropbox can check my account history to restore these photos for me?

[Jay]

If there is no history in the deleted files page, then it means there is nothing to restore.

This would be the same for the support team, so unfortunately, we wouldn't be able to recover the missing files on that account.

[Tim1985]

Hi Jay,

I am very disappointed to know I have to accept that my several gigs photo was deleted and Dropbox has no way to recover them.  I guess the possibility was that i used dropbox app to create photo folder locally, when Windows was reinstalled, the folder was removed and they were synchronized from the sever.

[Tim1985]

Hi

Since I did not delete my files and it must have some reason for that.  I believe that Dropbox has some responsibility for these deleted files.  I would like Dropbox give me a clear explanation for that otherwise it will happen again.  I would like to escalate Dropbox help to higher level to see if it is possible to find the reason and restore the files.