Character loss from 1.0?

When I first opened up FFXIV I was greeted with my old character in the character creation after the opening movie. However, after failing to log in with her thanks to the dreaded 1017 error she has vanished.

After much deliberation I realised I had seemingly no way of getting back to the import screen and getting her back so created a new character instead. That being said, is there any way to retrieve my old character?

I've tried going through the support documents, but it loops back on itself when I click 'additional support' and doesn't actually give me any contact information to work with. This seems like something only either an admin can assist with, or perhaps some sneaky way to access the import screen once again.