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          BBB Tip: Plan, prepare, respond and recover. Protect your business from a natural disaster

          By Better Business Bureau. October 27, 2022.

          No matter what time of year it is, weather, natural disasters, fire, or any other emergency can impact a business.


          It's important to know what the biggest risks might be.

          Lightning is a major threat from starting a fire, losing electricity for several days, or causing a power surge and damage to your business' computer network. In addition, summer storms can bring torrential rain, which raises the risk of flash flooding. Severe thunderstorms can be the biggest threat with frequent lightning, high winds, hail, and the possibility of tornadoes. Any or all of these factors could cause physical damage to your property leaving equipment, paperwork, and personal information open to theft and loss in general. It’s important to look at the most common threats from storms in your area and plan ahead just in case those threats can impact your business.

          Response and recovery

          There are two important components to plan for when putting together a plan: response and recovery. The response to a disaster is what you do as it is happening. How do you keep employees, customers, equipment, and property as safe as possible? Recovery is how you get your business back to full operations. What are some steps to take to help employees come back to work, equipment come back online, and customers come back in?

          A response plan starts with communication. When a storm hits, consider all of the ways to communicate to customers and employees how the situation will affect your company's operations. Will you close completely, have reduced operations, or be able to continue without major disruption? If there is damage to your equipment or property, does that shut everything down or can parts of your business stay open? Another critical part of a response plan is how you will protect sensitive information like consumer and financial data. They should both be protected from loss by having off-site backups in case of major damage to your facility or computer systems. But it should also be protected from theft during a disaster that interrupts business operations, for example, a strong gust of wind-shattering a window or door could expose the business office to the potential of theft.

          With a recovery plan, the goal is to get operations up and running as quickly as possible. That might mean boarding up a few windows and getting back to business, or it might require a longer-term plan. Regardless of what the intended plan is, practice it regularly and update it as necessary. Practicing a response and recovery plan not only helps make it second nature in a crisis but also confirms that the elements of your plan work. Keeping backups of important business information is not useful if those backups cannot be quickly and easily restored.

           

          Have a contingency plan

          If there is a possibility of a longer-term disruption to your business, have a business contingency plan in place. A business contingency plan goes beyond a response and recovery plan. These plans are designed to help support your business through a lengthy period of recovery and reduced operations. If the physical location is destroyed by a natural disaster, having the plan to accommodate employees and securing a temporary location or working with the appropriate agencies to rebuild can avoid some of the uncertainties being dealt with at the present moment.

           

          Prepare

          Once you have assessed the risks and created plans to respond to disasters as well as recover from both short- and long-term business disruptions, it’s time to put into place all the necessary components of those plans.

          Examples of advance preparations may include:

          • Backups of important information: this may include insurance documentation, computer hard drive backups

          • Spare equipment stored offsite: dependent on the type of business

          • Copies of disaster and recovery plans for all employees
          • Arrangements for alternative workspace or backup locations.

           

          This is not a comprehensive list. What your business needs will depend largely on the specific type of work your organization does, the specific threats from potential disasters that might occur throughout the year, and how much flexibility you have before recovering your entire company.

          When recovering and rebuilding, use BBB.org for a list of contractors to help get back in business.

          Consider having a cybersecurity plan in place to protect employee and customer information.

           

          For more information

          Stay prepared with BBB's storm resources and tips.

          Learn more about winter storm preparedness.

          BBB of Northern Colorado and Wyoming contributed to this article.