Georgia 911: Insurance & Emergency Information

Disaster Recovery Plan Checklist

• Allocate tasks and assign responsibilities to staff members who know your business best.
• Identify risks.
• Ensure each member of your organization has access to your disaster recovery plan, policies and procedures.
• Have an evacuation plan in place and organize practice drills.Register for assistance with the Federal Emergency Management Agency disaster assistance number, 1-800-462-9029 or 1-800-462-7585 or online at http://www.fema.gov/assistance/register.shtm.
• In the event of an emergency evacuation order, ensure employees are prepared to leave with critical office records or equipment should the need arise.
• Identify vital business functions along with how quickly these must be back in place to ensure business continuity.
• Ensure you have current contact information for each employee.
• Have a plan in place to house key staff members and their immediate family if possible.
• Have a disaster recovery location established to enable staff to access vital records, back up systems and supplies. This could be a satellite office, a hotel or the home of an employee.
• Ensure your critical equipment and data files are backed up along with computers and software. This could include customer information and orders, payroll and account information, inventories and employee files.
• Safeguard your business premises and equipment in the event of a flood, hurricane or other natural disaster or emergency situation to the best of your ability.
• Keep up to date contact information for key customers, business partners, insurance companies, vendors and suppliers.

In the event of an emergency or disaster it is important to keep a clear head, to ensure employee safety and that of their families and then to do what you can to protect your business operations. Make a list of what needs to be accomplished along with what the key areas are in getting your business back up and running. Allocate responsibilities so that nothing is overlooked and ensure two way communications between employees and department heads.

Another aspect of planning for a disaster is having a back up premises so that work isn't halted for too long causing too great a loss of revenue. There are many reasons why businesses may not be able to use their primary place of business including fires, floods, bio hazards, etc... Rather than writing it off as downtime businesses should have a plan to use a partner company's space, have employees work from home, or rent serviced office space. A list of move in, move out serviced office buildings in major cities can be found on this site.

Careful disaster recovery planning and procedures is vital to ensure employee safety and business continuity.