Switching from Google Workspace to a European alternative

For many small and mid-sized companies, Google Workspace has become the default. Gmail on your own domain, shared calendars, Drive and Docs in a single subscription. Even so, more and more companies are asking whether it should stay that way. This article explains how to move to a European alternative without bringing your team to a standstill for a week.

Why companies are looking elsewhere

First, what Google does well. Working on a document together in real time is smooth in Google Docs, Gmail’s spam filter is strong, and the service is reliable. If you switch, you want to find that level somewhere else.

The reasons to look anyway usually come down to three:

• A US company. Google is subject to US law, including the Cloud Act. That law can require Google to hand over data, even when it sits in a European data centre. You can read more in personal data outside the EEA.
• Per-user pricing. Every employee costs a full licence, including people who only read mail now and then.
• Dependency. Mail, files and the login to other tools all hang on one supplier. Why that is a risk is covered in less dependent on US technology.

The plan

1. Take inventory. List every account, alias and group (such as info@ or invoices@), every shared drive and who has access to it. Do not forget the accounts of former employees that are still being kept.
2. Find the apps that sign in with Google. Many tools use “Sign in with Google”: your accounting package, CRM, project software. The Google admin console shows which apps have access. Set up a regular login with your business email address for each of them before you cancel Google.
3. Choose the new supplier. Look at where the servers are, who owns the company, whether your mail program keeps working through standards such as IMAP and CalDAV, and how migration is handled.
4. Plan the DNS switch. A few days ahead, lower the TTL of your MX records so the change takes effect quickly. Pick a quiet moment, such as a Friday afternoon, and update SPF, DKIM and DMARC as well.
5. Move mail, calendars and contacts. Do it account by account. Make one large copy first, then run a final pass after the MX switch for mail that arrived in the meantime.
6. Move the files. Copy the contents of My Drive and the shared drives. Google Docs, Sheets and Slides are not ordinary files: export them as Word, Excel and PowerPoint. Afterwards, check documents with complex layout or formulas.
7. Tell your team. Explain well in advance what changes, when, and who to ask. A short guide for phone and laptop saves a lot of individual questions.
8. Keep Google read-only for a while. Leave the old environment in place for a month or two so people can look things up. Only cancel once you are sure everything has moved, and consider making one last full export for your archive.

Where it often goes wrong

Links to Google Docs in old mail. Years of mail contain links to documents in Google Drive. Once you cancel, those links stop working. Keep important documents with the client or project they belong to, so they can be found without the link.

Sign in with Google in other tools. This is the step most often missed. Cancel Google while your CRM still logs in through Google, and you are locked out. Work through step 2 completely.

Shared drive permissions. Copying files does not carry the permissions along. Write down beforehand who may read or edit which folder, and set that up again in the new environment. It is also a good moment to clean up old access.

Files that are only shortcuts. Drive often contains shortcuts to files owned by someone else. An export does not always include them. Check with the owner that the original is moving too.

How Binadit Workspace handles it

Binadit Workspace is mail with calendar and contacts on your own domain, webmail, Drive, Office in the browser on ordinary .docx, .xlsx and .pptx files, and video meetings with Meet. Everything runs on our own servers in the Netherlands, from a Dutch company, under European law. The Cloud Act does not apply.

The Binadit Workspace Migration app moves mail, calendars and contacts from Google Workspace, account by account. It does not move files from Google Drive; we help you copy those. Because mail works over IMAP, CalDAV and CardDAV, your team can keep using the mail program it is used to.

You pay per mailbox by size, from €2.95 per month excluding VAT and cancellable monthly, with one Drive storage pool for the whole company. Read more on the page about the Google Workspace alternative or see the pricing.