Migrate your Access database to a modern web application.

Multi-user from day one. Cloud-hosted. Full audit trail. No more single point of failure.

The case for getting off Access

Microsoft Access is a remarkable piece of software. It made it possible for non-developers to build real database applications in the 1990s and 2000s. Many businesses still run critical operations on Access systems that have been quietly working for 15 to 20 years.

The problem is everything around Access has changed. Access does not run on Macs. Access does not work natively in the cloud. Access locks records in ways that fall apart with more than a few concurrent users. Access security is a known liability. Modern auditors and insurers are increasingly unwilling to sign off on Access-based business systems. The software has not failed. The world around it has moved on.

Most Access migration projects fail because they treat the migration as a data transfer. It is not. The data is the easy part. The hard part is rebuilding the business logic that lives in Access forms, queries, and macros, often written by someone who has long since left the business. A migration that only moves the tables and not the logic produces a beautiful empty database and an operations team with nothing to do their job on.

The honest moment most agencies skip: some Access systems are not worth migrating. If the data is unimportant, if the workflows have been superseded by other systems, or if a SaaS like Airtable or Notion can do the job for $50 a month, we will tell you. We have done it. About one in eight Access audits we run ends with us recommending Airtable or a similar lightweight platform. The audit cost was $3,000. The SaaS subscription is the answer.

We have migrated more than a dozen Access systems. We know where the bodies are buried. If you have an Access system that is critical to operations and you are getting nervous about it, call 0431 000 062.

Symptoms to look for

Access systems do not fail loudly. They fail in patterns. If you recognise the following, the system is past its useful life.

• Your Access database only works on one PC. “Do not touch Brenda’s laptop” is a recurring instruction. The system is one hardware failure away from being a story you tell new staff.
• It crashes when more than two people try to use it at once. Locking errors, corrupted records, weekly restores from backup. The Friday afternoon database compact is now a permanent calendar event.
• The original author has left. Forms and reports are documented nowhere. Modifications are a guessing game. Half the queries reference tables that no longer exist or fields nobody uses.
• You cannot use it from home. Remote work means VPN gymnastics or driving to the office. The pandemic forced a workaround that everyone hoped was temporary. It is now permanent.
• Reports are exported to Excel before anyone trusts them. Access is the system of record on paper, but nobody actually trusts its output. The Excel sheet has become the real report. The Access database has become the receipt.
• You have a “do not upgrade Windows” policy. Because the Access database breaks on every Windows update. The whole office is now permanently on Windows 10, and the IT plan is “do not change anything.”
• Your insurer or auditor has asked questions about it. Cyber insurance renewal flagged it. The auditor flagged the lack of access logs. The risk has finally caught up to the visibility of the risk.

DIAGNOSTIC

If three or more apply, the question is not whether to migrate. It is how to do it without losing the institutional knowledge that lives in those forms and queries.

The migration method

Access migrations follow a specific pattern. The order matters more than the technology choices. Doing these out of sequence is how migrations turn into a six-month panic.

Extract the business logic

The first phase is archaeology. We open every form, every query, every macro, every report. We document what it does, what business rule it embodies, and which staff member uses it. Most Access systems have 30 to 80 distinct workflows. They all need to be inventoried before any rebuild can happen. The inventory itself is often more valuable than the migration that follows, because it is the first time the business has seen its own logic written down.

Migrate the data, in stages

Data migration is run in parallel with rebuild, not at the end. We pull the Access database into a modern PostgreSQL or MySQL schema (in your cloud account), with proper foreign keys, indexes, and constraints. The first migration is a snapshot. Once the new web app starts coming online, we run incremental migrations as workflows transfer. Every record is reconciled. Nothing is silently dropped.

Rebuild on a web application

The replacement is built on Symfony, served as a web application, accessible from any modern browser. Multi-user by default. Cloud-hosted. Backed up automatically. Auditable for every change. Mobile-friendly so field staff can work from a phone or tablet. The first time the office manager sees their workflow running in two browser windows on two different computers without breaking, the migration is already worth what it cost.

Cut over workflow by workflow

We do not switch off Access on a Monday morning. We move workflow by workflow. The Access database stays available throughout the migration. Each workflow goes live on the new system, runs in parallel for a defined period, and only after it is proven do we retire the Access equivalent. By the time we pull the plug on Access, the team has been using the new system for weeks. The cutover is a non-event.

Archive and document

The Access database is not deleted. It is archived in read-only form, accessible if you ever need to verify a historical record. We hand over a full export of the original Access file plus the new system’s source code, infrastructure documentation, and runbook. You can take the new system to any competent dev team and have them maintain it. Vendor lock-in is the reason most Access systems become legacy in the first place. We do not repeat that pattern.

Three engagement shapes

We structure Access migrations one of three ways. All three start with the audit.

• Access audit. From $3,000. Written audit of your Access system. Form inventory, business rule map, fixed-scope migration quote. About one in eight audits ends with us recommending a SaaS alternative rather than a custom migration. That recommendation is the audit deliverable, not a sales failure.
• Migration only. From $25,000. Migrate Access to a modern web app with feature parity. You manage ongoing support. Best when the Access workflows are exactly what you need and the goal is simply to get them off the dying PC and into the cloud.
• Migrate and improve. From $50,000. Migrate plus the features the Access system never supported (mobile access, integrations, modern reporting, audit logging, role-based permissions). Best when you want to use the migration as the moment to fix what was broken about the original system.

Call 0431 000 062 to talk through which fits.

Access migrations we have delivered

Three Access migrations. One named, two confidential at client request. Reference calls available under NDA.

Quickway, civil construction

• Problem: Eight separate Access databases tracking job records, plant, finance, and staff. None of them talked to each other. Reports were stitched together manually. The original developer had moved on five years earlier.
• Built: Single Symfony-based ERP with all eight Access systems migrated workflow by workflow over nine months. Old databases stayed live throughout. Full data reconciliation at every step.
• Result: Eight legacy databases replaced with one unified system. Three FTE returned to higher-value work. $90,000 a year in licence and labour cost recovered. Zero data loss across millions of records.
• Stack: Symfony 7, PostgreSQL, AWS Sydney, Doctrine ORM, custom Access-to-Postgres ETL.

A national specialty retailer, name confidential

• Problem: Customer records, stock counts, and purchasing all ran from an Access database that only worked on the office manager’s PC. The office manager was approaching retirement. The business had no plan for what happened next.
• Built: Migrated to a cloud-hosted web application accessible from any store. Integrated with their MYOB and Shopify systems. Built and migrated over 11 weeks.
• Result: Office manager retired with the system intact. Twelve store managers now use the same system simultaneously. Zero workdays lost to migration.
• Stack: Symfony, PostgreSQL, AWS, MYOB AccountRight API, Shopify Admin API.

A field services company, name confidential

• Problem: Field staff filling in Access-linked spreadsheets back at the depot every evening. Real-time visibility into job status was impossible. Customer ETAs were a guess.
• Built: Migrated Access to a Symfony web app with a companion mobile app for field staff. Real-time job updates from any phone. Offline-first design for sites with no signal.
• Result: Evening data-entry queue eliminated. Customer ETAs accurate to within 15 minutes. Foreman role refocused from data chasing to job planning.
• Stack: Symfony, React Native mobile, PostgreSQL, AWS Sydney, offline sync queue.

Who you will work with

Access migration is the kind of work where familiarity with the quirks matters more than raw talent. Linked tables, broken references, undocumented VBA, password-protected forms with the password long forgotten. None of it is news to us. The team that runs your audit is the team that does the migration.

How we ship it

Five named stages. Each one is fixed scope and fixed price. You can pause between any two without losing progress.

Most Access migrations run 10 to 16 weeks. Larger systems with 50+ forms run longer. We will tell you what is realistic at the end of the audit, before you commit to the migration phase.

Access migration FAQs