Tally Data Damaged? How to Recover Corrupted TallyPrime & Tally.ERP 9 Data in 2026

You open Tally to finalize your GST returns, but after you select your company, an error message flashes on your screen. Or worse, the company name itself has vanished from the list! Your financial data—the lifeblood of your business—is inaccessible. Panic sets in, and you try and restart the system or check the cables, but the “File Damaged” or “Memory Access Violation” errors persist.

At Stellar Data Recovery, we come across issues related to Tally data almost every week. You could be running Tally.ERP 9 or the latest TallyPrime, and still suffer data corruption. These Tally errors happen during Tally version migrations, sudden power cuts, or when network connections drop during a write operation. The good news? You can recover corrupted Tally data if you handle it correctly from the moment you spot the error.

So if you’re staring at a “bad file” message or your data folder has turned into zero-byte files, stop trying to copy and paste random files (which usually makes things worse). Instead, let’s walk you through exactly why this happens and how you can fix Tally data without losing your financial history.

Signs Your Tally Data Is Corrupted

If your Tally ERP data is corrupted, the signs may or may not always be subtle. Sometimes it screams at you with error codes; other times, your balances just don’t add up. Identifying the specific symptom helps in choosing the right repair method.

⚠️ Symptom	What It Indicates	Probable Cause
Error Code 407 / “Company Data Error”	Database manager can’t read file structure properly.	Header mismatch due to power failure.
“Memory Access Violation”	Tally crashes when loading a specific voucher.	Corrupted transaction or master record.
Company Name Missing	Folder exists (e.g., “10000”), but the name is blank in list.	Damaged Company.900 or Link.500 file.
“File Damaged” / “Manager.900”	Internal database tables are unreadable.	Bad sectors or interrupted write operation.
Zero-byte Files	Data files show 0 KB size in Explorer.	Severe structural damage or virus attack.

Why Tally Data Gets Corrupted

Data doesn’t just break on its own. Specific triggers cause the internal database structure to collapse.

⚡ Sudden Power Failure During Write Operations

This is the #1 killer of Tally data in India. If the power cuts while you’re saving a voucher, the transaction writes only partially. The database header says the file is of a certain size, say, 2 MB, but the actual data is shorter. That mismatch breaks the company file.

🔄 Interrupted Tally Migration

Moving from Tally.ERP 9 to TallyPrime requires rewriting the entire database structure. If this process crashes or is interrupted by a system restart, you get a “half-baked” database that neither version can open.

🖥️ Network Connectivity Drops

Multi-user environments (Tally Gold) rely on constant network packets between the server and client. A flickering switch or loose LAN cable during a “Save” command corrupts the packet, damaging the central data file on the server.

🦠 Ransomware and Malware Attacks

Modern ransomware targets database files specifically. If your Tally data files (.900, .tsf) get encrypted, they become unreadable to the software.

💾 Bad Sectors on Hard Disk

Tally data sits on physical sectors on your disk. If those sectors degrade (common in old HDDs), the OS can’t read the file bits, and Tally throws a “File Read Error.”

How to Fix Corrupted Tally Data

Before you call the experts, Tally has some built-in tools that can fix minor logical errors. These work for logical corruption where the file structure is intact but specific links are broken.

⚠️ Warning: Always copy your entire data folder (e.g., “10000”) to a different drive (like a USB pen drive) before attempting any repair. If the repair tool fails, it might strip data it considers “bad,” leaving you with partial records.

Method 1: Using “Repair” in TallyPrime

TallyPrime has a robust repair engine designed to handle migration errors and logical splits. Here’s how to use it.

1. Open TallyPrime but do not select the damaged company yet.
2. Press F1 (Help) > Troubleshooting > Repair.
3. Select the company from the list. If it’s not visible, you may need to manually type the path.
4. Press R to start repair. Tally will scan the database, rebuild indexes, and attempt to relink broken vouchers.
5. Check the exceptions report. TallyPrime generates a log of what it fixed and what it deleted.

Method 2: Using “Rewrite” in Tally.ERP 9

For older versions like Tally.ERP 9, the process is slightly different and uses the “Rewrite” command.

1. Start Tally.ERP 9. At the “Company Info” screen, hold Ctrl + Alt + R.
2. Select the corrupted company. You will see “Rewrite” appear in the menu instead of just “Select.”
3. Confirm the prompt. Tally will ask, “Rewrite? Yes/No.” Select Yes.
4. Wait for the process. This forces Tally to rewrite every single voucher transaction from scratch. It’s aggressive but effective for “Manager.900” errors.

Restoring From the “000” Folder in Tally

Sometimes the main company folder is toast, but you might find a “000” folder or similar temporary files created during migration or crashes.

When Tally migrates data, it creates a backup copy (often named with 5 digits). If your main data (e.g., folder 10000) is corrupted, look for a folder named 10000_backup or 000 inside your data directory.

How to Restore From These Folders

1. Rename the corrupted folder (e.g., change 10000 to 10000_Old).
2. Locate the backup/temp folder. Check the timestamp to ensure it’s recent.
3. Rename the backup folder to the original 5-digit number (e.g., change 10000_backup to 10000).
4. Open Tally and try accessing the company again.

This manual swap often works because the backup folder contains the data state exactly before the crash or failed migration occurred.

How Stellar Can Help Recover TallyPrime and Tally.ERP 9 Data

When built-in tools fail, or if you see “File Damaged” errors that persist after rewriting, you’re dealing with either physical corruption or severe internal structure damage. Running the repair tool repeatedly on such files can actually destroy recoverability by overwriting binary headers.

Stellar’s professional Tally file repair and recovery services in India specialize in these exact “dead end” scenarios. We don’t just run software; we can repair the database structure at the hexadecimal level.

🔬 Hex-Level Database Repair

Our lab engineers open the damaged .900 and .tsf files in hex editors to manually reconstruct broken file headers. We stitch together the “Masters” and “Transactions” tables link by link, recovering vouchers that Tally’s automated tools skip.

🛡️ Recovery From Encrypted Files

If ransomware locked your Tally data, Stellar’s research lab has proprietary recovery capabilities for certain ransomware variants. We can often extract the raw SQL-like data from the encrypted container and recover Tally data after a ransomware attack without paying the ransom.

💾 Zero-Loss Migration Recovery

Failed migrations often leave data in a “limbo” state (neither ERP 9 format nor Prime format). Stellar’s engineers extract the raw transaction data and rebuild it into a clean, importable Tally XML format compatible with your new version.

✅ 100% Confidentiality & ISO Certification

Financial data is sensitive. Stellar operates in ISO 27001-certified labs, ensuring your balance sheets and GST data remain strictly confidential throughout the process.

Preventive Tips for Tally Data Safety

You can avoid 90% of Tally corruption issues with simple discipline. Follow these preventive steps and you’ll never need Tally data repair.

☁️ Enable Tally’s Auto-Backup Feature

Configure Tally to take an automatic backup every time you shut down a company. Store this on a cloud folder (Google Drive/OneDrive) mapped to your PC.

🔋 Use a Dedicated UPS

Never run a Tally server without a UPS. A 1-second power flicker is enough to kill a 1 GB database file during a write operation!

🛑 Close Companies Properly

Never shut down the PC directly. Always press Esc > Quit? > Yes in Tally. This ensures the database commits all changes and closes the file handles safely.

🔐 Restrict User Permissions

In multi-user environments, limit who can perform “Split Company Data” or “Migration” tasks. These high-risk operations should only be done by the admin from the server itself, not a client node.

📂 Monitor Data Size

As Tally data grows (over 500 MB), it becomes more prone to corruption. Use the “Split Company Data” feature annually to keep file sizes manageable and performance snappy.

If you want a deeper, step-by-step understanding of Tally data recovery and prevention, these related guides will help you handle specific scenarios with more confidence:

• Best Tally Data Recovery Service
• How To Recover Tally Data From NVMe SSD
• How to Take Back Up & Restore Files in Tally

FAQs

1. Can I recover Tally data if I forget the password?

Passwords in Tally are encrypted within the company file. While standard recovery focuses on corruption, Stellar’s Tally Repair Services can sometimes assist in resetting admin access for legitimate owners verified with proper authorization.

2. Why does Tally data get corrupted during migration?

Migration involves rewriting the entire database schema. If the system crashes or loses power during this rewrite, file headers get mismatched, leaving data unreadable by either version.

3. How do I restore a Tally backup file (TBK)?

Go to Gateway of Tally > Alt+F3 > Restore. Select the destination and source (.tbk file), choose the company, and press Enter to unzip.

4. Can Stellar recover Tally data from a formatted hard disk?

Yes. Stellar’s experts scrape raw drive sectors to reconstruct specific Tally file signatures (.900, .tsf) even without the file allocation table.